I had two columns go up at the Athletic in the last week, one on the Dodgers signing Blake Snell and one on the trade of Jonathan India and Joey Wiemer for Brady Singer.
At Paste, my review of the heavy worker-placement game Nova Roma went up just before the holiday. It’s almost certainly going to make my top ten for the year.
If you’re looking for me on social media, you’re most likely to find me on Bluesky and Threads. I’m only posting links on Twitter at this point, but not answering questions or engaging with other content. You can also subscribe to my free email newsletter.
And now, the links…
- Longreads first: This piece from The Verge on one Amazon influencer suing another for stealing her vibe – I’m not even being sarcastic – is both bonkers and extremely thorough in its coverage of the real legal issues at play.
- Character.AI is a cesspool – now Futurism reports that the site hosts chatbots that encourage young people to engage in disordered eating.
- An infant died of whooping cough in Australia in the Queensland state’s worst epidemic of the disease, which is preventable via vaccines, except infants are too young to get the vaccine and enough idiots out there have listened to anti-vaccine misinformation that the disease is spreading all over the west.
- The worldwide trend of voters tossing out incumbents has had a few bright spots: an outsider to the political establishment in Botswana has ended the 58-year rule of the Botswana Democratic Party – the longest current reign of any party in a democracy in the world. The rival Umbrella for Democratic Change won an outright majority in the country’s Parliament, marking the first time in the nation’s history a party other than the BDP will rule.
- Dorothy Bishop resigned from the Royal Society over the group’s continued affiliation with Elon Musk, who was named a Fellow of the Society in 2018. Her resignation letter is pointed, measured, and I’m sure will be summarily ignored by the group.
- Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R) signed a bill that bans transgender students from using the correct bathrooms in schools, because the cruelty is the point. There is no evidence to support these laws, and they are not solving any actual problem.
- The sister of a woman killed by her ex-boyfriend last November in Italy continues to speak out and lead protests at the country’s culture of violence against women.
- Joel Grey wrote an op ed in the New York Times saying that we need to heed the warnings of Cabaret, the film for which he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1972.
- The idea that “woke” killed the Democrats in the 2024 election is wrong, but people are embracing it because it allows us to avoid making real, structural changes.
- Pentagon officials told The Intercept that Trump’s plan to use the military to conduct mass deportations is “absolutely insane.”
- Trump’s pick to head the NIH is “as bad as it gets.” Dr. Jay Bhattacharya was a vocal opponent of measures that helped slow the COVID-19 pandemic, including lockdowns and vaccine mandates, and argued that we should let the virus spread to achieve herd immunity, which would have led to hundreds of thousands or millions of more deaths.
- I hadn’t heard the term “leguminati” before, but I’ve come across those folks, often vegans or environmentalists who preach the power of legumes, pulses, and nuts to feed the world without destroying the planet.
“Woke” didn’t kill the Democrats in the 2024 election, but the attitude (which permeates this site) behind woke sure as heck contributed.
I didn’t vote for Trump, deem him unfit for office, and wish he wasn’t going to be the commander-in-chief again, but until those on the left hand side of the political spectrum recognize & acknowledge what originally gave rise to Trump in 2016 there will continue to be repeats of 2024.
What is that? Well, it’s the smarminess, arrogance, condescension, self-righteousness, savior mentality, and holier-than-though mindset that positively drips from the way the left’s viewpoints are presently expressed.
It’s the school of thought that gave us the ridiculousness of They / Them, the inanity of Latinx, and the absolute assault on the English language that is “people experiencing homelessness.”
You / we are, in fact, NOT morally superior to those who disagree politically, and people are tired of being talked down to. Oh, and none of us are actually intended to be The Thought Police.
The renaissance of Trump as the Republican nominee in 2024 was the public’s indictment of the left’s quintessence of being. His reelection was the conviction.
Do you think any political issues are primarily moral, or is it all just a game of power and interchangeable personal preference?
If moral political issues exist, and one side strongly supports the wrong position, is the other side not morally superior in that instance?
Maybe your real point is something closer to “projecting moral superiority isn’t a successful persuasion tactic” in which case, maybe? But also the winning campaign in 2024 expressed explicit contempt for their political opponents and promised to exact cruel revenge on them if given the opportunity, so it doesn’t seem like empathy and mutual understanding are primarily what the electorate was looking for this year.
Brent: I think this is a much better rejoinder to your claims than I could provide.
Also, the singular ‘they’ dates back to 1375. I believe that predates ‘woke’ by about 640 years.
When an election is decided by a small margin (in this case, a 1.5-1.6 percent difference in the popular vote and an electoral-vote margin that could have flipped if Harris had gained 230,000 additional votes in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania), everything that cost a candidate net votes arguably caused the defeat.
The funny thing about this election is that, when all the votes are tallied, Harris will end up with about 48.3 percent of the vote and Trump will have about 49.8 percent. Four years ago, Biden had 51.3 percent and Trump had 46.8 percent. It’s a three-point swing. If Democrats had declined from 54 to 51 percent and won the election (or from 49 to 46 and lost the election), no one would be wringing their hands. Because the three-point swing lost the election, it’s viewed drastically differently even though the fact remains that the Democrats are not significantly more or less popular than they were four years ago. It’s only because the electorate is so closely divided that we end up having these discussions about who is to blame for losing.
Another funny thing is that, for the eighth time in the last nine presidential elections, Republicans will have failed to obtain a majority of the votes cast. Where are the thinkpieces asking why Republicans are so out of touch with the American people, or demanding that they change course so as to achieve and maintain a lasting majority?
Right. You could just easily say that the ongoing issues (i.e. genocide) in Israel played a factor. We know for a fact that Harris drastically underperformed compared to other Dems in Michigan as a whole and especially Dearborn. The reality is that ongoing economic conditions have made it a tough time for incumbents around the world. Kamala bragged about owning a gun, being a prosecutor, and even had Liz Cheney campaigning for her. She ran the opposite of a woke or far left campaign and still lost.
All of this (what Brian in NoVa says) is true, but I want to add that the nature of Harris’ campaign is almost beside the point. Whether she ran a “woke” campaign or not, the Republicans and their propagandists in the media (e.g., Fox News) have done an excellent job of branding the Democrats as the party of “woke” excess and that generalized perception has much greater penetration with the broader electorate than what the candidate actually says and does in the day-to-day of the campaign. (See also how Biden would repeatedly say “Fund the police!” and it still didn’t stop the Democrats from being branded as the “Defund the police” people.) It’s almost like an inverse version of what happens with Trump. Every day during the campaign, he said and did batshit things, but many voters are not paying attention to any of it and just remember vaguely that times were better when he was president (whether they actually were better or not).
Although I do not vote Democrat (or republican), I am very unhappy about the buffoon elected president in 2016 and 2024.
I believe there is some validity to what Brent said, yet, his post was almost entirely dismissed by everyone who responded.
So, that’s it? That’s the narrative the democrats are going to fall back on from here to perpetuity? “We did everything we could, but we cannot gain any significant majority because the other side is just a bunch of ignorant hateful assholes who do not understand anything”?
Maybe that really is how things are. But there were times when democrat candidates performed very well, and did not need to rely on eking out minuscule victories that relied on a very small number of wing states. It wasn’t even that long ago.
I believe a strong candidate could perform similarly to how Barack Obama and Bill Clinton performed. The democrats just cannot seem to find that candidate.
As a final thought regarding Brent’s post: I am not even a republican, and have never voted republican. I have never made a public post supporting a republican candidate. And yet, the amount of hateful, angry, dismissive vitriol I have received publicly from hard-core democrats who are just so pissed off that I am not as far to the left as they are on some issues, is astounding. And highly irritating. They do in fact come across as everything Brent said : Smarmy, arrogant, condescending, self-righteous, and holier-than-though with a savior mentality. They cannot wait to tell me how wrong, uninformed, misinformed, or just plan foolish I am. They talk to me as though I have never read a book or studied politics or economics. Granted, these people are a subset of my democrat/liberal friends (I don’t have a lot of republican or conservative friends), but still, it’s a large enough subset that I feel there may be something to what Brent was trying to say.
And yes, the republicans do it too, as pointed out by CP. That doesn’t mean the democrats need to do it. They can aim to do better, and to work harder at finding common ground.
Frank, I don’t think that what you’re saying is off-base. I have seen this dynamic directed at people and I’ve said for years that I think it’s counterproductive. I would just point out that you may be overestimating the appeal of certain candidates. Bill Clinton received 43 percent of the vote in 1992 and 49 percent in 1996. He actually has in common with Donald Trump that neither has ever received a majority of votes cast in a presidential election. And even Barack Obama, for all of his genuine appeal across constituencies, received “only” 53 percent and 51 percent of the vote in his two elections. Those are small majorities by historical standards. Joe Biden actually received a larger percentage of the vote in 2020 (51.3) than Obama did in 2012 (51.1).
Frank jones:
I mean, sure, I too appreciate an ambiguous call for finding common ground and understanding. I think a lot of good faith political disagreement among private citizens is due to people fixating on different aspects of a cultural issue based on first principles, and then talking past each other without ever understanding the other person’s actual concern. That disconnect can sometimes be bridged in our personal lives through patient, nuanced conversations between people who still have respect for each other.
How does any of that happen at mass media scale between strangers, though, and particularly in the presence of an extremely bad faith right-wing media environment whose main goal is to conquer/humiliate/discredit those it disagrees with, with zero consideration of reality/truth? What common ground do you expect to find with that sort of partner? How were Obama’s or Biden’s attempts at seeking common ground received by their GOP “partners”?
Acting as if Brian’s post is somehow a reasonable, anodyne position requires overlooking takes which I find incredibly dubious: “It’s the school of thought that gave us the ridiculousness of They / Them, the inanity of Latinx, and the absolute assault on the English language that is “people experiencing homelessness.”
Latinx is one thing. Many Latin/Hispanic Americans don’t like the formulation, which is an excellent reason to question usage. I have never seen anything approaching broad usage of the homelessness phrase. They/them pronouns are anything but ridiculous. Characterizing them as such tells me the complainant is prone to discomfort at being asked to offer a basic form of courtesy that is of no cost to them.
I think it takes a remarkable lack of perspective and self-reflection to describe any of those as inane. The inanity is treating them as some grave threat to the culture and overreacting as so many have.
Good replies everyone; wanted to add one thing. I, an extremely obviously cis male, have very purposefully not provided pronouns in any setting ever, mostly as an experiment to counter the more extreme claims of the anti-woke set. I have *not a single time* been forced to or even really asked to provide my pronouns, either in a social or professional setting. So anytime someone complains about the supposed burden of conforming to modern norms, I think about just how small and non-existent that burden is in my own life.
In regards to the pronoun thing, I want to share why it’s done. A few years ago (late 2010’s), a series of incidents happened to my boss (a cis female) that led her to start including her pronouns in emails. The first was a conference call involving me, her, my department head, and a few people from a sponsor of ours. My boss has a first name that is very similar to a European male name. On the conference call, one of the employees from the other organization. kept mentioning how she loved working with “X” and how thorough he is. In real time, I couldn’t figure out what was going on (I was the only male at our org that they dealt with). Finally after the call, the three of us realized our sponsor thought we had a male employee with the name of my boss. Shortly after that, my boss got called by a client who was shocked to discover a female voice for the same reason. From then on, she started putting in her pronouns in emails to eliminate confusion. This was pre-pandemic and it was for clarity with people she might deal with later on. That was why people first started using pronouns in their email signatures. Other people started including their pronouns to show allyship with them. It was never supposed to be a divisive move. It was meant to help the person on the other end of the conversation.
I think e-Dub meant to say Brent, not Brian (although there are enough Brians here that it’s always a good option when in doubt).
The first time I became aware of pronouns in this context was when I was interviewed for a newspaper article a few years ago. At the end of the interview, the journalist asked me what my pronouns were. I was genuinely confused by this question. I asked her what she meant. She said, “Well, what pronouns do you use to refer to yourself?” Still not quite understanding, I replied, “Um, I and me?” I’m not sure exactly when I came to realize what this question was about, but it remains the only time I’ve ever been asked it.
It’s amusing reading through the responses to Brent’s comment, as some people are unwilling to accept he as a point. Brian in NoVA’s story stating the reason for pronouns is confusion with what gender a name is – while I’m sure that was true in that one case, to act as if this is the reason overall is simply to ignore reality. Heck, Kamala has “she/her” on her social media, and there’s no confusion over what gender she is. At this point, she’s literally one of the most well-known women in the world!
The point about singular “they” dating to 1375 doesn’t really make sense, as people aren’t quibbling with that type of usage. If one was to say “there’s someone off in the distance” and the reply was “what are they doing?”, that’s an unremarkable exchange. However, if one was to say “I saw our friend Jenny yesterday” and the reply was “how are they doing?”, that implies a lack of comprehension by the listener. The response would be a confused “no, I only saw Jenny, nobody else”.
I could go on, but these are two examples of the reason there’s a huge disconnect between a vast swath of voters and the Democratic party, the result of which was Republicans winning the presidency and both houses of Congress. To pretend otherwise is to be exactly like Seymour Skinner: “Am I so out of touch? No. It’s the children who are wrong.”
Enjoy the clip! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVddGSTjEd0
I don’t doubt that ‘wokism’ however defined turns off a lot of people. But I also don’t really know what the Democrats should do about it other than hire a fucketonne of social psychologists to help fight back on emotional grounds. The anti-trans ads on TV were gross and probably worked in a Willie Horton way, but should the left just abandon trans people and take on the right-wing position? Pro-civil rights politicians weren’t going to win in the South in the 1960’s, but would it have been right at the time give up those principles to maybe win some elections? Or fight the best you can to sway minds over time? I concede that I’m out of touch with ~50% of voters, including some of my own family members. It’s frankly one of the reasons why I am losing hope for the country. Should I just give up and say ‘do it to Julia?’
@Salty-Scientist
Yes, those anti-trans ads were nauseating. No, people should not give up on fighting for equal rights for marginalized groups.
One problem, as I see it, it that not everyone agrees on what constitutes “equal rights”. And I believe that is what Brent was trying to get at, and Drew as well.
I’m not entirely sure how to articulate my intended thoughts without having people pounce on me as some sort of bigot, but I’ll try:
Supporting equal rights for marginalized groups can go too far and eventually reach the point of absurdity. For example, men’s and women’s sports. A person who has gone through puberty as a male has obvious and numerous physiological advantages over a biological female; advantages that cannot be wiped away by hormone therapy. Yet, pointing this out, or, objecting to participation in women’s sports by people who were born male and went through puberty as a male, results in dramatic cries of transphobia and bigotry.
A person can support legal rights for trans people while still objecting to biological makes playing women’s sports. There’s a reason those sports are designated “women’s sports”. It’s because biological males have overwhelming physiological advantages.
I’ll prepare for the usual onslaught of comments telling me how wrong and transphobic I am.
A person who has gone through puberty as a male has obvious and numerous physiological advantages over a biological female
But the evidence doesn’t support this view. Shouldn’t we rely on the evidence we have, rather than feelings?
I also agree with A Salty Scientist: Almost nobody arguing against trans women participating in women’s sports cares about women’s sports. It is a wedge issue, just like bathroom bans. There’s no evidence that trans women, or men pretending to be trans women, are attacking anyone in bathrooms. There is a much more widespread issue of sexual abuse and assaults within religious institutions, but nobody is arguing to keep kids out of churches or clergy out of public bathrooms. Both issues are just ways to leverage anti-trans sentiment into electoral support. It’s a classic technique of would-be autocrats that Hannah Arendt outlined in The Origins of Totalitarianism: identify an unpopular “other” and rally public sentiment against them.
@Frank, I think there can be some nuanced and good faith discussion there. We are a sexually dimorphic species, and much of the conversation is unfortunately conflating sex and gender. The problem is that right wingers are using those topics for culture wars when they don’t give a flying fuck about women’s sports (see their general disdain for Title IX, the WNBA, women’s soccer). How do you have a rational discussion with people who call you groomer and/or trans-investigate you on the regular?
I realize that this is largely a liberal post-mortem on this site, but as an aside it bothers me that we rarely see articles or comments calling for conservatives to be introspective. There are several articles about how every governing party facing election in a developed country lost support, with Harris losing among the least. Global inflation created a strong headwind, and I think a ‘normal’ Republican candidate would have done a lot better than Trump, who has a high floor of support, but a low ceiling. The culture wars work for a while and then they don’t as opinions gradually shift (see polling on support for gay marriage). Same with cults of personality. Yet I see little from conservatives except doubling down on vindictiveness and grievance.
I figured the reason we rarely see articles calling for conservative to be introspective had something to do with the word itself – “conservative”. To me, it always had a connotation of “stuck in the old-fashioned, established ways”. If someone says, “When I was a kid, blah blah blah, and we turned out fine so we should continue doing it that way”, or, “The bible says [whatever], so therefore [some stupid policy],” I am not sure how much value there is in wasting time asking that person to be introspective.
I would think it’s obvious that changing with the times is a good thing, and I would think it would be obvious to bible thumpers that not everyone acknowledges the validity of their book.
I don’t know how to have a rational conversation with the types of people you described. I recall an instance in which I defended a drag queen’s right to exist and not suffer violence from hateful people, and I was quickly called a groomer. There really isn’t much common ground to be reached there. I responded by saying that defending a drag queen does not equate to being a groomer, and that I did not believe that being a drag queen makes one a groomer and left it at that. Any further discussion would have been wasted energy.
But, when the subject of men’s and women’s sports comes up, I avoid the reflex response of, “What? You do not support literally everything having to do with trans rights in any way? You’re a transphobe and a bigot!” Maybe that’s easy for me to do because I’m not a Liberal, but I prefer to think of it as being easy because, as you said, there is some nuance to that conversation and some room to have a good faith discussion.
I wish I could write more, but typing is physically uncomfortable for me.
@Frank, the conservative ranks used to have intellectuals, especially in the field of economics. I even parted with liberals and agreed with them on things like the benefits of free trade. Those folks actually were thoughtful about the direction of the conservative movement. Now even the smart ones like Vance are simply craven opportunists. Anyway, I think I answered my own question–conservatives have over the last decade bled the intellectuals out of their ranks, along with introspection and any sense of shame. They should still get called out on it.
@Keith:
Yes, I agree with you that the hysteria about supposed attacks and/or assaults in the bathrooms is invented nonsense. I also agree with you that widespread sexual abuse within religious institutions is a real problem. You said “but nobody is arguing….”
I have no objection to eliminating organized religion altogether. I believe organized religious has caused immeasurable suffering throughout the ages. I know a lot of people who agree.
The bathroom issue is a different issue than the one I raised. The bathroom issue arises from a societal expectation of bathrooms segregated based on the type of sexual organs people have. It should be a separate debate whether this segregation of bathrooms (and locker rooms) makes sense. In a lot of ways, it doesn’t make much sense, and a lot of problems could be avoided by just doing away with this altogether. My college dorm had a restroom / shower area that was open to all students regardless of sex or gender. Thus, no such fuss about who was using which bathroom was even possible. There were zero issue with assaults, peeping toms, or whatever else. Everyone was respectful of everyone else. Maybe we should move in that direction as a society.
But until we do, is it really that odd for girls/women raised from childhood to expect not to see penises in the bathroom or shower area to be puzzled / confused / uncomfortable when someone with a penis is in the bathroom? That discomfort doesn’t automatically mean that person is transphobic.
As for your remark that the science does not support hat I wrote:
I am not entirely sure I understand what you are saying. Is it your assertion that post-pubescent males have no physiological advantages over females? Because…. that’s so bizarre I wouldn’t even know how to respond. So, I assume that is not what you are saying, which leaves me unclear on what it is you are actually saying. Perhaps you could clarity? I do not want to inadvertently make a straw man here.
However, if one was to say “I saw our friend Jenny yesterday” and the reply was “how are they doing?”, that implies a lack of comprehension by the listener. The response would be a confused “no, I only saw Jenny, nobody else”
Lol are you being serious? Who in their right mind would be confused by this? What you are describing is a very standard usage of english. You acknowledge they can be singular and then use it in a sentence with only 1 noun referenced, meaning the singular they is very easy to decipher using the sentences own context
I’m with Tony. People use the singular “they” in that fashion all the time, and have for centuries. What is relatively new is the idea of someone asking others to use the singular they for them as their preferred pronoun, and I see zero reason why that should bother anyone. Use this one-syllable word instead of that other one. If you can’t make that tiny effort, you are the problem.
Are we really arguing that biological males have no physical advantages over biological females? Really? No wonder Democrats get crucified on this issue even if it outweighs its impact on voters’ day to day lives.
Mark,
I don’t think that’s what Keith was saying. Keith was replying to a very specific statement I made – though I still wasn’t sure exactly what was being said, hence my request for clarification.
Here was my exact statement and Keith’s reply:
FrankJones: A person who has gone through puberty as a male has obvious and numerous physiological advantages over a biological female
KLaw: But the evidence doesn’t support this view. Shouldn’t we rely on the evidence we have, rather than feelings?
So, my point was that some of the obvious physiological male advantages (height, wingspan, hand size, etc.) are not going to just disappear simply because someone takes testosterone blockers or estrogen hormone therapy to transition to female.
Perhaps that is what Keith was replying to and disagreeing with?
Besides that, I have often seen the statement, “A trans woman is a woman. Period.”
Okay, uh.,.. no. A biological male saying, “I am a woman, period. I demand to play in women’s sports” is an absurd statement. So, it is NOT always the case that “a trans woman is a woman, period.” The annoying emphasis on the final word of that statement completely ignores the obvious fact that a trans woman, especially a non-transitioned one, is, in fact, biologically male in many very important ways. I am not sure how this is even a discussion.
Would you guys believe that women’s sports leagues have already thought about this and addressed the matter such that some random guy can’t say “I’m a woman now” and join a team? It’s almost as though you have a fundamental ignorance on the matter that disqualifies you from speaking on it.
And to think y’all are making these arguments on a day where a case is being argued before SCOTUS to uphold bans on trans healthcare (which are effectively bans on trans people existing). Way to miss the forest for the wildly insignificant trees.
I was wondering how long it would take before a condescending self-righteous keyboard warrior would illustrate my point by arrogantly telling people how wrong they are.
Nobody is missing the forest for the trees. (Also, what you consider insignificant might be significant to others. Who are you to say what is significant to whom?)
Women’s leagues have addressed this issue? How? When? If you have so much more knowledge than everyone else, share it instead of just acting like a smug smarmy jackass.
I don’t particularly care about this issue much – I do have an opinion on it, but it doesn’t affect my life one way or the other. I was giving an example of an issue that I have seen OTHER PEOPLE care about enough to potentially affect their vote.
But apparently that was lost on you. Maybe you couldn’t see the forest either since you are too high above it on your very high horse.
As for a ban on trans health care – yes, that’s absurd and outrageous. What’s your point? I don’t recall anyone in this conversation saying that a ban on trans health care is just or reasonable.
Who exactly are you railing against here??? I am an independent voter who does not vote for either major party, merely attempting to analyze a post by someone who was attempting to explain why the Left seems to be losing traction.
Your vitriol is uncalled for. Do better. Or just keep doing what you’re doing. It’s been working great so far, right?
Nothing I said was arrogant nor condescending. I just correctly observed that you were pontificating in a public forum about a matter that you seem to know little about.
Policies for trans people in sports have existed for some time and have been well-reported on in prominent places. Here is one (https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/42549609/inside-san-jose-state-university-2024-volleyball-season-gender-fairness-safety):
“The NCAA adopted a policy governing transgender athlete eligibility in 2010. That policy came out of a think tank hosted by the National Center for Lesbian Rights and the Women’s Sports Foundation in 2009. Helen Carroll from NCLR and LGBTQ+ sports equality advocate Pat Griffin facilitated discussion with doctors, scientists and transgender athletes and wrote the longer guidance to accompany the policy. It required transgender women seeking eligibility for the women’s category in any of the NCAA’s three divisions to suppress their testosterone levels for one year before competing. Transgender men wanting to compete in the men’s category could do so at any time, and they could no longer compete in the women’s category if they began taking testosterone as part of their medical transition.
“It worked pretty well,” Griffin said. “It was pretty uncontroversial for 10 years until it became a political football.””
That last line is key to your point about “other people caring about the issue.” I can assure you that the number of people who genuinely care in good faith about “protecting” women’s sports from trans people is close to zero. You do not have to care about or grant consideration to bad faith concerns about protecting the sanctity of women’s sports from people who a) never said anything about women’s sports before yesterday or b) didn’t say anything about these policies when they were uncontroversially put in place years ago. The idea that this sort of thing is separate from general trans rights, the thing you claim to support, is incorrect at best. Like with any other civil rights struggle, right-wing cranks hammer away at edge cases exactly like this one in the hopes of gathering enough of a level of popular permission to enact their more holistic programs of discrimination.
So when you ask who I am railing against or why I have any vitriol for those who waffle on this matter, that’s exactly it. You can’t let anyone, even yourself, express casual equivocation on what are effectively questions of fundamental rights. Because if you do, before you know it, those rights will be gone.
“Nothing I said was arrogant nor condescending.”
You must have different definitions of those words than most people.
“I just correctly observed that you were pontificating in a public forum about a matter that you seem to know little about.”
Yep, nothing condescending there.
Also, you did not in any way address the point I made, which makes your arrogance and condescension even more laughable. I’ll repeat what I wrote, since reading comprehension seems to be a weak point for you:
“A person who has gone through puberty as a male has obvious and numerous physiological advantages over a biological female.”
What the hell does one year of testosterone suppression have to do with this? If Victor Wembenyama or Mike Tyson underwent one year of testosterone suppression, are you really suggesting it would then be reasonable for them to participate in women’s sports? You cannot be serious?
And, the fact that Lia Thomas, a mediocre Men’s swimmer, suddenly became a top 5 swimmer once she started competing against women… this has nothing to do with the inherent biological advantages of being born male? Really?
So, you dodged entirely the main point I made, verbally attacked and insulted me in a condescending and arrogant way, and then doubled down on it.
And yet people like you wonder why some people just can’t stand smug, arrogant assholes like you. Go figure.
Then there is this gem from you:
“I can assure you that the number of people who genuinely care in good faith about ‘protecting’ women’s sports from trans people is close to zero”
On what basis are you asserting this? I mean, you can assert whatever you want. I can then rightly dismiss your nonsensical and unsupported assertions.
The fact that transgender men can compete in Men’s sports without restriction, but cannot compete in women’s sports if they began taking testosterone as part of transitioning, pretty much makes the point. Testosterone provides an advantage. This is an indisputable scientific fact. Also, what is this saying? A transgender man who has not used testosterone can compete in either men’s OR women’s sports? So, once again, the statement “A transgender man is a man, period” is shown to be false. A transgender man is a man, unless he wants to compete in women’s sports, which, inexplicably, he is allowed to do, even though he is not a woman?
WHAT?
And to you, this not only makes sense, but it is absolutely necessary, because if we do not allow this absurd policy, then the supreme court will take away health care rights for trans people? WTF?
You are calling trans people in sports an “absurd policy” but you also asked “Women’s leagues have addressed this issue? How? When?” You are admittedly ignorant on important aspects of the matter and yet have passed judgment on it nonetheless. Me saying that you have “a fundamental ignorance on the matter that disqualifies you from speaking on it” is as dispassionately as I can phrase a pretty basic factual analysis of the situation. If you consider such an approach “verbal attacks and insults,” well, there’s not much I can do about that.
w/r/t to asserting bad faith on behalf of anti-trans pundits, well, it was there in my previous post. These policies have been in place for some time, but only became an issue when Chris Rufo and friends decided to make it an issue. More generally though, Rufo himself basically confesses to this all the time. On Twitter or in interviews with The New Yorker or whatever he will clearly say that the object of the messaging he is pushing is besides the point, rather it’s just what will best promote an overall right-wing agenda.
A good description of this here: https://www.unpopularfront.news/p/were-all-postmodern-neo-marxists
You are being ridiculous. You are making no attempt to have a good faith conversation. None whatsoever.
My asking you to give details on something that I do not believe has actually occurred is NOT an admission of ignorance on my part. The fact that you have reached that ludicrous conclusion shows just how arrogant and self-righteous you are.
You are the epitome of exactly what brent described. So smug, arrogant, condescending and superior to all us intellectual peons who know nothing and are just so wrong all the time.
If someone says, “Humans have landed on Mars” and I reply, “Oh really? How and when??” that is my expressing disbelief, NOT my admitting ignorance. Can you really not tell the difference?
It is your OPINION that I have a fundamental ignorance here. It is an opinion not backed my anything you have said.
Do you really mean to assert that ONE YEAR of testosterone suppression eliminates all physiological advantages males have over females? That is some bizarrely delusional nonsense. What, all the muscle mass, height, arm and hand size, lung capacity, etc, just all disappears and becomes female? REALLY ???????????? And why do you keep IGNORING this point, when it was in fact my ONLY POINT I was making in the first place ????
Let me try a different approach with you, even though you seem hopelessly intransigent and incorrigible.
I will make 5 statements:
1) Trans people have the right to health care.
2) Trans people have the right to vote and enjoy full citizenship status.
3) Trans people have the right to be free from physical attacks or harm, just like all people do.
4) Trans people have a right to enjoy and utilize public services, just like all people.
At this point, liberals and democrats love me! And conservatives hate me. They call me a groomer and all sorts of other stupid and nasty shit. This is why I will never vote republican, along with about 4 dozen other dealbreakers: Abortion, death penalty, drug policy, etc.
But now I add a 5th statement:
5) Trans women enjoy physiological advantages over biological women, and thus should not be allowed to participate in women’s sports.
And now suddenly liberals and democrats hate me. It’s absurd.
Also, you say that “no one cares”, yet obviously a lot of people do care. And, in an election that was razor thin, and resulted in a truly horrible human and truly horrible president being elected, everything matters. Personally, this had zero effect on my vote. I stopped voting democrat 20 years ago and I have never voted republican and never will. But that doesn’t mean OTHER people’s votes were not affected.
And who are you to speak for a country of 300 million people when you say, “no one cares”? What a pompous and arrogant thing to say.
People like you are the problem. The hateful conservatives are always goi to vote conservative and republican. But, with narrow margins, and with a great many voters and potential voters out there identifying as third party, independent, undivided, or just generally not voting, your sanctimonious attitude is baffling.
Do you just completely lack and self-awareness regarding how you come across to others?
This is similar to the Harrison Butker speech. I thought it was a really idiotic speech, but I also indicated I did not’ think it warranted the widespread attention it got.
I was harassed by the extreme left for not expressing the identical level of outrage that they did. When did we reach a point where we must all express equal outrage at everything ???
And here we are again. I pointed out an example of an issue that some voters may have been affected by – trans women in women’s sports – And I’m being criticized, harassed ,insulted, and belittled because my level of support and the extent to which I am willing to fight for trans rights falls short of someone else’s standard od what is required of me.
I support trans rights. Playing in women’s-only sports is not a right. Debate the point with me if you wish, but stop with the insults, and stop with the fallacies and the pompous presumptuousness. And keep in mind what the ORIGINAL post was about. As I said, this issue has zero effect on my own voting preferences. My interest in the topic is purely of an intellectual nature. I have passionate opinions on many topics that do not apply to me: Abortion, death penalty, etc.
When it comes down to it – Do sports really matter at all? We are all here, I assume, because at some point we were followers of Keith’s excellent work as a sportswriter and journalist. But what importance are sports, really? None. It’s entertainment. Society does not need sports. So, if we as a society are going to care about sports, to the point where sports are multi-billion-dollar industries, who are you or anyone else to that the issue I raised is a non-issue?
I am very confused here. I am responding to the specific things you say with the assumption that you both are purposeful in what you say and mean what you say. In other words, I am assuming that you truly do support trans rights, and am responding directly to the apparent contradictions in this position that you explicitly mention. This is the epitome of good faith!
To this end, “And now suddenly liberals and democrats hate me” and “stop with the insults” seems revealing to me. If you can’t handle disagreement or debate without perceiving that people hate you, that’s on you. And, I mean, let’s be honest here, “People like you are the problem” can be read as far more of an “insult” than anything I’ve said here.
To your contention that “a lot of people do care,” do you think a lot people care about Critical Race Theory? It was a big deal among right-wingers a few years ago, but I don’t remember hearing it mentioned once during the presidential campaign. It’s almost as though the vast majority of right-wing culture war grievances are manufactured outrages that go away when the people producing the outrage stop talking about them. Which is the exact thing I showed in my previous post.
Finally, back to the original matter. “Do you really mean to assert that ONE YEAR of testosterone suppression eliminates all physiological advantages males have over females?” I mean, yes, that’s basically the gist of it. The biological root cause of sexual dimorphism in humans is pretty simple in that your X/Y chromosomes produce a few hormones that do all the work. That you are still hammering away at this point suggests one of two things: Either you are ignorant of the biological reality of gender/transness/etc or you are fundamentally bigoted against gender non-conforming people and will just argue anything that makes such a position justifiable. I have (in good faith) assumed the former to be true, both because it is much more flattering to you and because it allows for the chance of having a productive discussion.
@CB
I don’t see this the same way you do. Perhaps you can provide an example to illustrate your point?
I am still waiting for you, Mike, or anyone to address my original point.
Also, my pointing out that someone is being condescending and talking down to people does not in itself constitute my being condescending and talking down to people.
@Mike:
I believe I do support trans rights, but I have been told by some people that I actually don’t, and I have been called a bigot and a transphobe, because, despite the first four statements I made, people take issue with the 5th statement.
I am not saying YOU called me a bigot or a transphobe. I am saying that sometimes has been a knee-jerk reaction from people who are dissatisfied with my support for equal rights unless I agree with them on literally every detail.
I can handle debate and disagreement just fine. Notice, I had a polite exchange with Salty Scientist and Keith. My main issue with you is that you specifically have been very rude to me. And when I point out that rudeness, you (or CB) then use that as an example of MY being ruse. I mean, who can’t handle what, exactly? Am I not allowed to say, “I do not appreciate your tone and manner in which you are speaking to me, and I find it rude and insulting?” Because, I feel as though I pretty much said that, and your reply amounted to, “I am not saying insults, I am saying facts, and the facts are you are wrong and uninformed, so that’s your problem if you feel insulted”.
When I said, “people like you are the problem”, I meant, with regard to Brent’s original post. I meant, people like you (or more precisely, the manner in which you are talking to people whose views you disagree with) are why some neutral or independent voters feel turned away from voting liberal or democrat.
Do you really believe that your heavy-handed approach is a good way to accomplish your goal? (I assume your goal is to bring neutral, independent, third party, etc, voters over to the liberal/democrat side so we do not need to endure disastrous presidencies when a completely unqualified buffoon like DT get elected.)
If that is your goal, and that’s what this original discussion was about, I humbly suggest that your approach could use more tact and less self-righteousness. If you disagree with me that you lack tact and have demonstrated self-righteousness, compare your tone and word choice to that of Salty Scientist, whose reply to me was, “There’s a nuanced conversation to be had here.”
I do not know how many people care about Critical race theory. I have not spent much time studying this topic. From what I’ve seen and read, I think Critical race theory is a good thing, and I do not understand the objections to it.
Yes, I agree with you that most right-wing outrages are manufactured outrages. I generally find the right-wing platform abhorrent. But I disagree that trans women in women’s sports is a good example of this. Keep in mind, I originally mentioned this as an example of an issue that I believe OTHER voters care enough about to affect their voting. Personally, this issue has zero effect on how I vote. (I have made this point several times). I tried to avoid giving my own opinion on the issue, because my own opinion is irrelevant. What’s relevant is how OTHER people feel about the issue with regard to their voting preferences.
So, just to be clear – I may have a very strong opinion about something, but that does not mean it affects my voting. For example, I am very strongly pro-2A, but that has zero effect on my voting. I am still not voting for right-wing conservatives, even though pro-2A is a big part of their platform.
But, to say that no one really cares about trans women in women’s sports? Have you been on YouTube at all? I find the topic very interesting and thus I have read many articles and watched man videos, on both sides. Some of these videos have a very high view count and a very high comment count. How can you say no one really cares?
People spend hours and hours debating who deserved which post-season awards or all-star nods or HOF inductions. People care about these things, a lot, even though they’re mostly meaningless to people’s lives.
One year of testosterone suppression may reduce the advantages of having testosterone in the system. I have not heard or seen evidence or studies showing that they reduce a person’s height, hand size, arm length and size, etc. Some results of being biologically male are permanent. I am puzzled as to how this is continuing to be a point of debate. I am well aware of the effects of testosterone in the body. I have studied it extensively, for my own personal reasons. I understand what happens when a person has very high or very low testosterone. I am not suggesting that a person who has undergone testosterone suppression will still perform the same as before the suppression. I was referring to the permanent physiological advantages of being male that cannot be undone by suppression therapy. I feel as though I have been clear on this point, but maybe it got lost in the shuffle.
Did Lia Thomas go from 500th ranked to 5th ranked because she suddenly improved significantly as a swimmer? I don’t think any evidence supports that. More likely, her sudden ascension in the rankings has to do with the fact that she physically towers over her opponents. Her physique (The parts of her physique that are not changed by testosterone therapy) is an excellent swimmer’s physique. The same way being tall and long-limbed is an advantage in basketball. Does anyone doubt that Shaquille Oneal or Victor Wembenyama, even after a year of Testosterone suppression, would dominate Women’s basketball and score 50 points a game?
Your original comment in this thread was plainly ignorant on the matter. I responded somewhat flippantly (“would you guys believe”) specifically to echo the tone of your comment. You keep saying I am being “insulting” but without any specifics…what am I saying that is specifically insulting? The only thing I can muster from a review of my comments is that you are reading “you have a fundamental ignorance on the matter” as “you are fundamentally ignorant.” The former thing is a factually-based judgment on the specific matter at hand while the latter is a more general insult. If you feel insulted by the former, again, that’s on you.
“There’s a nuanced conversation to be had here.” The idea of nuance, while certainly useful in general, serves as nothing more than a thought-terminating cliche here. The previously existing policies for trans inclusion in sports, as well as the science behind them, are pretty straightforward. The “points” you are making have been addressed and countered on this blog my Keith, me, and others, many times.
Your concern about “permanent physiological advantages of being male” is largely orthogonal to the matter at hand, which is why I have not specifically addressed it, but I might as well. Take height for a specific example. The vast majority of cis female basketball players are taller than me, an average-sized cis male. The height aspect of my maleness confers no advantage for me if I suddenly decided to transition and play women’s basketball. It follows that exceptional differences in height, indeed the ones that are advantageous for playing basketball, are far more variable *within* biological sex groups than they are *between* groups. Making this as an argument against trans inclusion in sports largely besides the point. (there’s a side argument here about how if right-wingers genuinely cared about this, they would fully support trans healthcare for youth, so that trans women wouldn’t undergo the male puberty which gives them these supposed advantages. But, uh, they don’t support that)
The idea that the subject matter of popular videos on YouTube reflects some sort of organic surge of anti-trans sentiment among the people consuming the videos is (sorry if this is “insulting”) the most absurd thing you have offered here. I don’t think you really believe that, sorry.
“I assume your goal is to bring neutral, independent, third party, etc, voters over to the liberal/democrat side” I could not give two shits about the Democrats, beyond the fact that it would be mildly better for most people if they were in power. I have brought up the election as a matter of context, but I promise you I am not trying to get you Frank Jones to vote for Democrats, and I’m fairly surprised that you would even assume that based on what I have said. My only concern in this conversation is to advocate for trans rights in an area (sports) that is currently in contention.
@Mike
You just used a lot of words to basically admit that you have nothing of any value to add and that you are going to regurgitate the same nonsense over and over.
You have your opinions, I have mine. In my opinion, you have not adequately supported your opinions and have been very dismissive of anything I have said.
I do in fact firmly believe everything I wrote. I wonder the same thing about your posts, since, in my opinion, what you are saying is so outlandish it’s difficult to believe you really believe what you are writing. Maybe you’re just trolling me to get a rise out of me, who knows? And, from my vantage point, you seem fundamentally misinformed and ignorant about the discussion – which is exactly how you feel about me.
So, shall we agree to disagree and move on? We’re not making much progress.
Apologies, one last thought about your final paragraph, which I didn’t read carefully before writing the above.
The initial post by Brent was an attempt by him to explain why the democrats have done poorly. My intent was to address that topic, using trans women in sports as an example. It was never my intent to actually debate the issue.
Based on the general tone of this blog, and your posts, I (apparently mistakenly) thought you would prefer the democrats to have done better in this recent election but differed with me on why the democrats failed. It seems I made an incorrect assumption, and for that I do apologize. Aside from that, I stand by everything I wrote.
And, in general, but NOT addressed to you specifically, because you already said it does not apply, there ARE plenty of liberals / democrats who DO want to sway neutral voters to their side and who DO take a very condescending heavy-handed approach that turns people off. I mistakenly thought you were one of them.
FrankJones: It is remarkable how you can, apparently with a straight face, chastise and lecture other readers of this site for talking down to people.
I’ve read your answers here, and they are dripping with anger and condescension. And when you get any pushback, no matter how respectful or diplomatic, you go on the offensive with personal attacks and tone policing. Perhaps you should heed some of your own advice?