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Bath Spa University is conducting an internal inquiry into claims that it turned down an application for research on gender reassignment reversal because it was "potentially politically incorrect" and would attract criticism on social media.
James Caspian, a psychotherapist who specialises in working with transgender people, proposed the research about "detransitioning" to the university in south-west England, which, he said, initially approved the application.
When he went back with his preliminary findings that suggested growing numbers of young people, particularly women, were regretting gender reassignment, Bath Spa said his proposal would have to be resubmitted to the ethics committee, which rejected it.
Caspian, who enrolled on an MA course at the university, said he was "astonished" by the decision and had sought legal advice.
"The fundamental reason given was that it might cause criticism of the research on social media, and criticism of the research would be criticism of the university. They also added it's better not to offend people," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Monday.
I was going to add some snark here but they pretty well covered making a mockery of academia for me.
Source: The Guardian
Also at: The Times
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 10 2017, @01:50PM (30 children)
I have to take my geek hat off on this topic and ask a normie question: Why are we as a society talking about transgender issues all the time now? Transgender people are a vanishingly small portion of the population. Who cares?
I've said in the past it has to be a parlor bet between two media moguls, but it keeps going. There are huge issues that affect everyone on this planet, issues that need to be worked on and solved right now, to the point that wasting time and effort talking about totally irrelevant stuff like this is criminally negligent.
It would make much more sense to talk about the plight of one-armed people, how oppressive it is for them to live in the midst of a world designed for two-armed people, than it does to focus on transgender issues.
I live in New York City, which you would think would be an epicenter of transgender people in America, and in the 20 years I've been here I've seen exactly two, out of literally millions. I've seen more Malians playing the kora in the subway than transgenders. Can we now go on and on and on about Malian kora players?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Knowledge Troll on Tuesday October 10 2017, @02:22PM (10 children)
How do you know how many trannies you've seen? I know a person that was so convincing I didn't know they were not female until one day they needed to take two weeks off of work for the surgery and to recovery from it. Your confirmation bias stinks.
As for the plight of one armed people, let me know when laws start showing up regarding which bathroom they can use and when people start assuming some kind of sexual predator risk because of that single arm.
It makes sense to me to raise awareness on this issue and especially so on the topic of this article.
Calm down, your dick is safe, you don't have to chop it off just because other people decide to.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 10 2017, @02:43PM (6 children)
I think you should ask yourself that question, my friend. Maybe you don't rub elbows with a lot of different people in your daily life, but one does here. One learns how to discern who's Jewish from Gentile, real Africans from African Americans, Sikhs from Hindus, and so on. In short, I bet my trandar's much better than yours.
Laws about trans people and bathrooms only showed up because they started this whole trans hysteria in the first place. It only became an issue when they made it an issue, so great work there, guys. And one-armed people experience subtle, pervasive discrimination every day, every time they go to put on clothes or open a door or use a computer or drive a car. Everything in the world is against them, not just bathrooms. There, see? I just made a much, much more compelling case for discussing one-armed people issues instead of trans anything.
Awareness about the trans issue is irrelevant to anyone who is not trans, because for every trans person there are hundreds of thousands of people who aren't.
Instead of spending time and energy going on and on and on about who has what genitals, because nobody cares, why not spend that time and energy on climate change, or dysfunctional democracy, or any of a number of other things that affect everyone?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by i286NiNJA on Tuesday October 10 2017, @05:30PM (2 children)
This is a good point. My whole life I was told that there was some trans-people somewhere... since at least the early 90s. That these people had another sex on their drivers license and are legally permitted to use that bathroom. I shrugged my shoulders and went on with life.
It wasn't until trans activist became a career field and selling kids unprescribed hormones over the internet became an industry that all of this became an issue really.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday October 10 2017, @11:32PM (1 child)
You know you're a damned liar. I know you're a damned liar.
Have your alternative, feminist-approved facts, then.
(Score: 1) by i286NiNJA on Tuesday October 10 2017, @11:57PM
I don't even know what you're contesting here.
I grew up in a purple state and in the mid 90s I was aware that somewhere there were trans people and word on the street was they were legally considered another sex. It was sort of a rumor-fact like but I assumed it was probably true.
It was never an issue until little johnny could go to girloids.com and buy a bunch of titty pills instead of going to a doctor. I'm not surprised that it turns out that many people regret transitioning these days. Jesus christ here I'm a radfem suckling SJW and then tomorrow someone will call me a alt-right nazi.
What exactly am I lying about?
(Score: 3, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday October 10 2017, @06:07PM (2 children)
Laws about black people and bathrooms only showed up because they started this whole equality hysteria in the first place.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 10 2017, @07:30PM (1 child)
Nonsense. The Civil Rights movement began as a reaction to Jim Crow laws. Jim Crow laws were enacted as a reaction to Reconstruction. Reconstruction happened because the South lost the Civil War.
Glib rhetorical constructions don't stand up to a knowledge of American history here.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday October 10 2017, @08:49PM
You mean the Jim Crow laws [wikipedia.org] that mandated segregation of public facilities such as bathrooms?
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 10 2017, @06:34PM
I met her in a club down in North Soho
Where you drink champagne and it tastes just like cherry cola
See-O-L-A cola.
She walked up to me and she asked me to dance.
I asked her name and in a dark brown voice she said, "Lola"
L-O-L-A Lola, lo lo lo lo Lola
Well, I'm not the world's most physical guy,
But when she squeezed me tight she nearly broke my spine
Oh my Lola, lo lo lo lo Lola
Well, I'm not dumb but I can't understand
Why she walk like a woman and talk like a man
Oh my Lola, lo lo lo lo Lola, lo lo lo lo Lola
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 11 2017, @05:20AM (1 child)
> How do you know how many trannies you've seen?
Transvestites = trannies as in humans who cross dress as the opposite sex.
Trans = Trans-sexuals as in using chemicals to negate/block/change the natural script embedded in DNA.
If you're going to use Marxist ideology to invent new words and meanings, at least get them right you ignorant tool!
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday October 11 2017, @04:37PM
I am asking this in all seriousness: WHAT did Marx have to say about transgender/transsexual people? Granted I've only skimmed Das Kapital and found it boring as hell, but he was an economic theorist wasn't he? As opposed to a gender/sexuality researcher?
See, I keep noticing a lot of people on here referring anything they don't like/understand as "Marxist" and it's really really weird. It's almost like you don't actually know what you're talking about and are just barking some emotionally-loaded snarl word.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 3, Interesting) by isostatic on Tuesday October 10 2017, @03:32PM (5 children)
I believe the argument goes "if you have privilege you can't complain". Anyone with "privilege" has to virtue-signal at every opportunity otherwise they get shunned by the type of society that isn't the other end of the spectrum.
Social media, and the liberation of peoples voices, has broken the overton window, which used to be set by central powers - the newspapers, TV shows that everyone watched, etc.
There are two windows now, both moving from the centre in extreme directions. If you are traditionally "centre-left", you find that the only ones close to your views are to the left, so you tend to shift left. If you'd traditionally centre-right the same applies. Voices compete to signal their belongedness in each group, which pushes the two groups further and further apart, and makes compromise unthinkable. Even if you don't personally shift your own views, and intellectually you recognise people from the unextreme in the other group, your tribes are so far away that you can't make the leap.
Until there's enough people that realise "enough is enough" and a 3rd tribe in the middle forms, using both people from the left and the right, we'll carry on with more and more signalling on both sides, pushing the extremes more and more :(
(Score: 1) by i286NiNJA on Tuesday October 10 2017, @06:10PM (3 children)
It really seems like we're moving farther to extremes but the extremes are just getting louder.
I know the right thinks the whole left are privileged crybullies who cry about safe spaces and dye their hair green.... I know as a leftie I was pleasantly surprised how unanimously my right leaning friends denounced the charlottesville nazis, I didn't see any of "there were two sides" shit. At worst they bashed antifa who I don't really like either.
It's a huge problem though I got no answers. If you see someone on your team acting out be quick to shout them down and laugh when they try and paint you as a false follower I guess.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 10 2017, @07:21PM (1 child)
Is that why they're dying their hair green? Here in the People's Republic of Park Slope, Brooklyn, there have been quite a few people doing that. I figured it had to be some kind of progressive tribal marking, but didn't know the provenance. Do you? Is it environmentalist or something?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 1) by i286NiNJA on Tuesday October 10 2017, @11:20PM
I just picked a random color.
I think the tendency to dye their hair comes from a belief that they're quirky and special and a desire for attention. These are some of the most rich and privileged kids in america and somehow they think their time in ivy league social science classrooms will enable them to become hero to the marginalized people of america. When you're that special people need to be able to see it right away.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by isostatic on Tuesday October 10 2017, @11:02PM
I think that's the point though - the extremes end up drowning out the majority, however the majority formed their world view at a time when extremes weren't normal, when the people you saw on the nightly news were disagreeable, but not mad.
How do people form worldviews today, when what they're exposed to is the volume of the extremes. 20 years ago news may have been the guardian or telegraph or mirror or sun, with the knowledge that Trevor McDonald and John Simpson filled the air. That status quo hadn't changed that much for 50 years. Sure there was the occasional "German Jews pouring into the country", but on the whole things you read weren't as extreme, or as accepted. Scummy publications along the lines of The Canary or Brietbart just didn't have any traction.
Now they do, and a whole generation seem to follow those types of publications and people. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe they don't have as big a following for the future.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 10 2017, @07:27PM
Or it's another device to divide everyone and keep the outrage machine primed. Everyone stopped giving a crap about marijuana and gays getting married, and The Powers That Be had to scramble to come up with something else. Honestly, choosing transgenders is weak beer. Who cares? Statistically speaking 99% of humans have never met a transgender in their life, so asking them to get worked up about their plight is like asking your average man on the street to wax apoplectic about the theoretical rights of aliens on Alpha Centauri. At best you'd elicit a shrug.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday October 10 2017, @06:32PM (11 children)
Transgender people are a vanishingly small portion of the population. Who cares?
Equal Protection Under the Law is a foundational principle in our society.
When it fails it always fails at some small portion of the population.
People have asked the exact same question about EVERY violation of this principle.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 10 2017, @07:36PM (1 child)
And why do you get so much more worked up about equal protection under law for transgenders than for the far more numerous population of one-armed men and women? Are they not as, if not more, deserving of having special laws passed to protect and honor them? Is their plight not worthy of being written into every screenplay for educating the masses, of drawing articles from flagship newspapers like the Washington Post and New York Times, of causing re-education, I mean "sensitivity", trainings in corporations, schools, and cities across the country?
I'll tell you why. It's ridiculous to pander to every thinly sliced cross-section of humanity like that, especially when you're not really after equal protection under law for all but to gin up another bullshit cause to outrage and divide people so they don't notice that the lizard people are *still* stealing everything that isn't nailed down. It's absurd.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 4, Touché) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday October 10 2017, @08:51PM
All Americans deserve equal protection under the law. Find me the laws that target one-armed people in an unfair manner and I will oppose those as well.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 10 2017, @07:40PM (8 children)
How are transpersons not being treated equally? I went to school with someone who was born intersex and recall no issues.
(Score: 3, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday October 10 2017, @09:30PM (5 children)
How are transpersons not being treated equally? I went to school with someone who was born intersex and recall no issues.
Anti-Transgender Legislation Spreads Nationwide, Bills Targeting Transgender Children Surge [hrc.org]
Even if you ignore the "bathroom bills" you have bills that allow public employees to deny government (taxpayerd funded) services to Trans people based solely on the fact that they're Trans.
That's the very definition of un-equal protection under the law.
(Score: 0, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 11 2017, @12:09AM (4 children)
I've not read the PDF but there is no so thing as "transgender", there are 2 human genders denoted by the presence of a (male) Y chromosome. I also reject the idea of transsexual children. [soylentnews.org] There was never a problem with intersex or transsexual individuals before the SJW crowd started crying victim on their behalf.
I'm sure exhibitionism has a neurological component, should we let nudists walk around naked? What about paedophilia, are paedophiles being oppressed by laws designed to protect children? What about psychopathic murderers, they're born incapable of empathy and yet society "oppresses" them by preventing them killing anyone who looks at them the wrong way? Why shouldn't a sociopath be able to knife you to the floor and steal your wallet and phone? Almost like liberal society denies people their impulses and desires all the time in service of the common good?
When I was young, I played in local punk bands and dyed my hair funny colors. I had friends with tattoos, piercings and strange fashion senses. I currently converse with a few transsexual people as a part of my job. Liberalism doesn't mean letting my 13 year old daughter go to a public bathroom unattended when there's some rainbow haired, tattoo'd and pierced, "transgender" freak in there. We should simply designate the disabled toilet as "disabled / other" and be done with that issue. Make a statement to society and society will make a statement back. The SJW morons need to realize that their destructive narcissism is the cause of intersex and transsexual prejudice and that the ire is ultimately going to be directed in their direction.
Social justice warriors are narcissistic abusers that fuck things up for everyone, how many (feminist) Harvey Weinstein's will it take to get the message through?
(Score: 2) by chromas on Wednesday October 11 2017, @04:51AM
Yes. They want to be called pedosexuals now.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 11 2017, @06:34AM (1 child)
Listen, you total waste of protoplasm! I will fix your statement for you, for True Justice!
There, FTFY. No run along and get your gender fixed to match your biological sex. I recommend a very large 4X4 Pick-em-up Truck. Maybe with some Truck Nutz on the tow-hitch, so that at least one of you can have some balls.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 11 2017, @10:37PM
Thank you for proving my point with your social constructivist SJW fantasies. I'm left wing, forgive me for pointing out that people with excessive piercings, tattoos and died hair who dress as the opposite gender may have issues. Not like I've hung around with people exactly like this or have enough experience to justify exactly why, as a parent, it's my duty to keep such people away from my young children.
I'm not singling anyone out, there's plenty of people who dress in suits that I'd keep my children away from too. Am I somehow oppressing successful business people?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 13 2017, @06:18AM
Sure. Walking around naked doesn't actually hurt anyone, even if there are snowflakes who get offended by it. You're anti-freedom if you think government thugs should be able to stop people from walking around naked on their own property or in public.
I don't understand. The mere fact that someone is a pedophile does not mean they hold a desire to rape children in reality.
At any rate, this is irrelevant to transgender people.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 11 2017, @01:12PM (1 child)
Then this person was incredibly lucky.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 11 2017, @10:20PM
No, he was not. Life dealt him a bad hand before he was even born. [wikipedia.org] There were no broader issues for discussion. The guy was picked on like everyone else at an all boys school; this person was not ever, to the best of my knowledge, bullied.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 10 2017, @09:09PM
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/10/06/hedg-o06.html [wsws.org]
Also applies to other things. A distraction. Lot of noise for some things while others stay as always.