Opinion of Memphis

[Antonio the Sixth]

This

Of course the immediate tendency for most people (particularly over a certain age) leans towards finding the whole trans thing as (at best) a bit weird; it runs very much against the way we're socialised from a very early age. But the same was true of homosexuality not so very long ago as well. Sometimes we have to revise our attitudes; fundamentally we are talking about a comparatively tiny group of people who are no threat to anyone (and not even, not really, to the various gender and sexual identities of the rest of us), and who are, fundamentally, real people with real feelings.

Or, rather:

Earlier this year a transgender teacher at a primary school in Lancashire killed herself after being persistently harassed by journalists; harassment that included a vicious verbal assault in a widely-read column in a national newspaper.

and this

May I ask you a question? Can you commit to not railroading people's beliefs, personalities, and habits into inane generalizations against their will in the future? If not, why not?

are the most important points brought up so far. How surprising Memphis hasn't even bothered addressing them.

[Sbane]

SawxDem's pics are what makes this thread worthwhile.

I totally don't get those. Oh well.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

I think the one thing I learned from these threads is how deeply ingrained the desire and sense of being right is here.  The Atlas forum is overall a self satisfied bunch. The culture is frequently bereft of any sort of consensus building or common ground in arguments these days. This I would think is a by product of being a rather homogeneous male bastion.  And I think of lot of this is based on class even more than gender.

For me, this thread was never about being right. It was about doing the right thing and not letting bigotry fly.

Not, you don't care about bigotry. You just have a strange love of mob politics and have proven yourself to be a bigger asshole than Memphis ever could be. I think the "AUTISM AUTISM" thing was some of the worst bigotry ever to be posted here; I should know; when I first joined this forum, I was going through a "white nationalist" phase, and put a ton of regrettable and hurtful sh*t out.

[Bacon King]

Until now I've watched this from the sidelines but I think I've collected my thoughts enough at this point to express my full opinion. First off, I think almost everyone on both sides have been making a lot of unverifiable assumptions and implications, which is a bit silly.

Memphis doesn't understand transgenderism. Most Americans don't. My browser's spellchecker doesn't even understand that it's a word, because it placed a squiggly red line underneath it. It's a relatively new concept that seems "weird" for many people because it strongly contradicts how they were socialized, and that's not something someone can always change at-will. It's not something that one can even comprehend changing, even. Do I think Memphis's views are correct? No. Does the simple fact that he holds them justify, to any extent, the outrage against him? I don't really think so.

I also saw a few sexist comments Memphis made that I don't agree with, yeah, but that doesn't call for a witch hunt either. The viewpoint he's describing is very common among men, from my own observations. It's not something most men would articulate in person, and certainly not in public, but it's there. I'm not surprised by this latent misogyny especially because Memphis is a fellow Tulane alum. Maybe other colleges are the same, I don't know, but this attitude was so ubiquitous among both men and women on campus that even I, for a while, began to assume that it's just a part of how people usually are.

So I disagree with him, but I understand where he's coming from. I think he should at least get credit for being able to articulate his beliefs on gender, though, because it demonstrates he has the self-awareness to understand his opinion on an issue that, for most men, is rarely more than an unchangeable subconscious assumption. I can't decide if that makes it better or worse. One on hand, he's shown the potential for acceptance. On the other, it kinda reminds me of this guy. The rape stuff was really bad, too, but I'm not sure if he fully realized the implications of what he was saying (if so that's really horrible, but if not, the instant abrasive reaction didn't really help him see flaw in his reasoning).

I suppose that displaying the pictures was also in bad taste- not because he's showing them, but because he's showing them to the Atlas Forum. Honestly, assuming he's tagged in those pictures then anyone who is memphis's friend would be able to see those people anyway. Similarly, there's quite a few of you on my friends list, who can see pictures of girls I know, but that doesn't mean I did anything wrong. The bad part is really the context, posting images of women while proving you're not sexist. And that really highlights what's been the biggest source of outrage here: Memphis is really bad about putting his foot in his mouth.

But anyway, a question for Nathan et al: is this how you normally respond to people who refer to trans people negatively? I really hope not, because this is a horrible bandwagon that would only be justifiable if he was, like, a literal Nazi. Someone even implied that he wanted to kill off everyone with a blue avatar earlier! Honestly, what the [Inks]? That's insane.

And even if you do believe such behavior is justified, it's still utterly ridiculous. If you think he's in the wrong then educate him, tell him your story, try to get him to understand what it's like to be in your shoes. People such as memphis, you can't expect them to accept and understand transgenderism through direct pressure or through threat of exile from the public sphere via marginalizing their views. You can't expect them to have an epiphany overnight. Social acceptance is something that grows with time, within individuals as well as society at large. You transgendered folks are fighting against a very extensive history of cisnormate hegemony, and attitudes like that don't change overnight - just look at how difficult of a time homosexuality is still having after all these years.

I'm not intending to single anyone out here, and I fully acknowledge that what I'm about to say is a generalization and borderline stereotypical. But honestly, as my lesbian roommates would say, "y'all are acting so trans," and I know many others of various genders and orientations who would agree with that sentiment. If you're not aware of transgenderism's most common stereotypes, including (especially?) from the groups you share an acronym with: transgendereds are often considered to be bombastic and self-righteous to the extreme, who view pretentiously themselves as superior and enlightened compared to everyone else, who view the world in a with-us-or-against-us mentality, and who often play the victim card at the first chance. I do not possess this belief myself; I would never presume to judge an entire group of people in such broad strokes, especially of such a negative tone. However, I hear this view expressed from enough people to know it is widespread and not isolated to my own greater peer group. I've even heard serious suggestions from three unrelated people that "LGB should kick out T" because they consider the above stereotypes to be true and believe the entire movement is being held back as a result.

This is the first time I've read, firsthand, transgenderism defended against someone who denied its status as a legitimate thing. It's been vicious. Needlessly vicious. And it instantly brought to mind all the associated stereotypes. Maybe none of you guys are normally like this, and I'm probably horrible for bringing this up anyway but I just want to help. I do support you guys. I do think Memphis was wrong. But the outrage against him was ridiculous. I know nine people who would be allies of the transgendered movement but for the fact that its members drove them off for various reasons. I'm pretty sure you guys lost several potential allies here. I know I have no right to tell anyone what they should do, but I believe it would be much preferable if you didn't match hostility with hostility. I didn't read every post of every thread but I didn't see anyone try to explain on a personal level their "story" of transexuality to memphis, it was just insults, hostile banter, and the treatment of an emotional and personal issue as if it was something quantifiable. Maybe I shouldn't be making this into a bigger issue, I'm just trying to explain that, I don't know, even isolated incidents can justify stereotypes for life. On some level, even, I'm pretty sure I had to write this all out because that allowed me to think about it consciously, and had I not done so I probably would have taken this incident and used it as the rationalization to get on board with my trans-hating roomies.

Eh, this entire huge post will probably make both sides hate me because I'm trying to define where I stand on complicated issues and be helpful in a way that probably makes me sound like a douche. But really, even if this request is naive, hopeless, and cliche, I ask of both parties involved here: can't we all just accept each other and get along?

[Morning in Atlas]

No lie, the only part of this drama I care about are the faceswap opportunities.

[rejectamenta]

Not, you don't care about bigotry. You just have a strange love of mob politics and have proven yourself to be a bigger asshole than Memphis ever could be.

Excuse me? I am one of the few people here fully criticizing Memphis for his atrocious sexism, transphobia, and fake "leftism", rather than blindly defending him for all of the above. I was one of the very first people here to engage him - and the forum - on the issue, so your claim that I'm only supporting "mob politics" holds absolutely no water. Furthermore, don't you dare claim that I don't care about bigotry. I have a reason to care, because it's precisely because of bigots like Memphis that certain people incredibly close to me are unable to live the lives they want thanks to stigma and social rejection.

You do not know me, Paulbot. You have no idea why I care about Memphis being an utter tool. Don't claim to have a clue.

Jesus Christ, you people really are insane.

[Sbane]

No lie, the only part of this drama I care about are the faceswap opportunities.

Wait, are those pictures of Memphis? So confused right now.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

Not, you don't care about bigotry. You just have a strange love of mob politics and have proven yourself to be a bigger asshole than Memphis ever could be.

Excuse me? I am one of the few people here fully criticizing Memphis for his atrocious sexism, transphobia, and fake "leftism", rather than blindly defending him for all of the above. I was one of the very first people here to engage him - and the forum - on the issue, so your claim that I'm only supporting "mob politics" holds absolutely no water. Furthermore, don't you dare claim that I don't care about bigotry. I have a reason to care, because it's precisely because of bigots like Memphis that certain people incredibly close to me are unable to live the lives they want thanks to stigma and social rejection.

You do not know me, Paulbot. You have no idea why I care about Memphis being an utter tool. Don't claim to have a clue.

Please look the following from the "48 Laws of Power."

Law 6
Law 9
Law 15
Law 34
Law 37
Law 45

[Sbane]

Also, great post BK. I am also trying to understand better what would cause someone to think they are of the wrong gender. Is it based totally on expectations society places on the different genders (and if so, don't the same people say all differences between the genders are made up by society...meaning they are still men?)? Or does it go deeper than that. And if it does, how do they know what it is like to be a woman or a man, if that makes any sense. How do they know they are women if they don't know how a woman thinks like. I probably don't make any sense, but whatever. It seems like just asking questions might get you labeled a bigot by some....

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

An FF.  I haven't read most of the threads that seem to get him the HP votes, but from what I've seen, he's a good guy.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

But anyway, a question for Nathan et al: is this how you normally respond to people who refer to trans people negatively? I really hope not, because this is a horrible bandwagon that would only be justifiable if he was, like, a literal Nazi. Someone even implied that he wanted to kill off everyone with a blue avatar earlier! Honestly, what the [Inks]? That's insane.

The answer to your question is, in my case (I'm not sure I appreciate being named before an 'et al' or treated as some sort of coordinator or ringleader), no. He and I have had words before, on multiple subjects, and very rarely good ones.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

People have tried to do that multiple times, both on this occasion and in the past. Perhaps not sufficiently so, or sufficiently gently so, but he's never seemed receptive.

Thank you sincerely for your thoughts. I'm painfully aware of the paradigm you're describing and would hate to think I'm contributing to it, but for my part it's hard to know how exactly to keep in line the levels of sheer frustration that this and other situations in the past have induced in me.

Also, great post BK. I am also trying to understand better what would cause someone to think they are of the wrong gender. Is it based totally on expectations society places on the different genders (and if so, don't the same people say all differences between the genders are made up by society...meaning they are still men?)? Or does it go deeper than that. And if it does, how do they know what it is like to be a woman or a man, if that makes any sense. How do they know they are women if they don't know how a woman thinks like. I probably don't make any sense, but whatever. It seems like just asking questions might get you labeled a bigot by some....

I'd be willing to either discuss this with you or point you to people who more successfully could once matters have cooled a bit (assuming they do).

[Morning in Atlas]

No lie, the only part of this drama I care about are the faceswap opportunities.

Wait, are those pictures of Memphis? So confused right now.

Yeah. To try and prove he wasn't sexist, he posted pics of himself with women, so I made faceswaps.

Even then, riffing on Memphis gets old:

[Lief 🗽]

I think the most interesting part of those pictures is that people in "the heartland" really do dress very differently from people on the east coast.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

Undershirts are the worst. Ack.

[Sbane]

No lie, the only part of this drama I care about are the faceswap opportunities.

Wait, are those pictures of Memphis? So confused right now.

Yeah. To try and prove he wasn't sexist, he posted pics of himself with women, so I made faceswaps.

Even then, riffing on Memphis gets old:

I see. I must have missed that. Or maybe that was in IRC or something.

[traininthedistance]

lots of stuff

Speaking as someone who is pretty obviously on Nathan and drj's side of the argument here, I think this is quite thoughtful and reasonable, and I have a hard time disagreeing with much of it at all.  As I alluded to, my problem is not so much memphis' views (I fully accept and understand that they are ingrained within many well-meaning people who just don't know any better), but his resistance to re-examining them at all.  I just put a high premium on "the examined life", as it were, and I think it's important to listen to people with divergent experiences, in general.

FWIW, I do think there is one person on "our" side of the argument here who has overstepped the line from justified, righteous indignation to counterproductive, gratuitous assholery in this thread.  And it's neither Nathan nor drj.

[Morning in Atlas]

No lie, the only part of this drama I care about are the faceswap opportunities.

Wait, are those pictures of Memphis? So confused right now.

Yeah. To try and prove he wasn't sexist, he posted pics of himself with women, so I made faceswaps.

Even then, riffing on Memphis gets old:

I see. I must have missed that. Or maybe that was in IRC or something.

It's on Page 75 of the Deluge. Check the Goldmine for the faceswaps, I can't be bothered to sift through this page for all of them.

[Kitteh]

I understand where BK's post is coming from. I am familiar with the stereotype of  trans people being very abrasive and assholish (for lack of a better word) when dealing with anti-trans people. I'm not sure to what extent I embody this stereotype, tbh I'm fairly shy and not confrontational IRL so I don't think I do. But at the same time, I think this is very understandable if you put yourself in the shoes of the average trans person. None of what memphis has said is anything anyone who is trans has not heard dozens of times in their life, including, often especially, from very close people, family, etc (fwiw, the most negative reaction to me being trans of anyone I know IRL was from my parents, my IRL friends have all been very accepting, but I guess that's because you choose your friends, not your family). So a lot of the hostility towards memphis is not really about him, it's just hearing the same old arguments and attacks yet again from a different place. The personal effects of hearing this kind of thing over and over again from all different angles including society as a whole should be easy to see. If the reaction against him seems disproportionate to what he said, I think that's a lot of why. For example, when people bring up the issue of trans people committing suicide, it's not implying that memphis wants people to kill themselves, it's that constantly being bombarded with transphobic arguments virtually identical to the ones memphis has used here does lead to that endpoint for all too many people, sadly. I hope that anyone can understand that; it really doesn't take a lot of difficult empathy or anything.

I guess I have very complicated feelings about telling people to respond less hostilely to comments like the ones memphis has been making. One the one hand, it is probably true that there are some otherwise supportive people who are turned off by such attitudes. OTOH, I really can't in good conscience tell people who are deeply hurt and legitimately angry that they should be less angry in order to make their cause more politically viable.

[Kitteh]

Also, great post BK. I am also trying to understand better what would cause someone to think they are of the wrong gender. Is it based totally on expectations society places on the different genders (and if so, don't the same people say all differences between the genders are made up by society...meaning they are still men?)? Or does it go deeper than that. And if it does, how do they know what it is like to be a woman or a man, if that makes any sense. How do they know they are women if they don't know how a woman thinks like. I probably don't make any sense, but whatever. It seems like just asking questions might get you labeled a bigot by some....

I'm perfectly fine with people asking questions like this, sbane. In fact I'm happy when they do so, because it shows trying to understand something you don't which is really very difficult and admirable.

Problem is, I don't really have a good answer for you. All of these questions are things I've asked myself throughout my life, and while I've come up with a number of answers, none of them are really satisfying to me. I guess eventually I've just come to realize that even if I can't really understand why or how or what this is, I do know that I am happier and more comfortable with myself living now as a woman than I was as a man, and that is all that really matters in the end. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Insula Dei]

And he only shows the respect for religion and conservatives that they usually deserve, of course.

The fact that you think that is hugely troubling for somebody who, like it or not, is living in a society with people who are otherwise than himself. Read some Levinas or Buber. Do your heart good.

Actually, don't bother with the Buber. But do read the Levinas. Very important thinker, and not just in some sort of empty, pious way. I think Levinas is the author who has meant the most towards shaping my own little vision of life. The irreducibility of alterity is really something people should try to grasp. And the absoluteness of the moral appeal, of course.

(though Levinas' main weakness is the way he always manages to reduce his most subversive ideas to banality. So the appeal of the face-à-face is infinite, but we shouldn't forget about the claim 'le tiers' (the absent other) has on me!!! So, in reality the appeal of the immediate presence of the other is pretty limited.)

[memphis]

I think the most interesting part of those pictures is that people in "the heartland" really do dress very differently from people on the east coast.

If it makes you feel any better, none of the girls from the pics currently lives in Memphis anymore and only two grew up here. One is from Milwaukee and the other from Philly. Of the two who are from Memphis, one currently lives in Oakland, CA and the other in Brooklyn. Sadly, most fun people with the option leave Memphis in search of places with higher concentrations of other fun people.

[courts]

What's "sjw"?

social justice (keyboard) warrior.

[courts]

Also, great post BK. I am also trying to understand better what would cause someone to think they are of the wrong gender. Is it based totally on expectations society places on the different genders (and if so, don't the same people say all differences between the genders are made up by society...meaning they are still men?)? Or does it go deeper than that. And if it does, how do they know what it is like to be a woman or a man, if that makes any sense. How do they know they are women if they don't know how a woman thinks like. I probably don't make any sense, but whatever. It seems like just asking questions might get you labeled a bigot by some....

ironically it seems like the answer is biological. brains don't match up with their gender. believe the east germans found something similar back when they were doing illegal experiments although that was with homosexuals.

[Antonio the Sixth]

What's "sjw"?

social justice (keyboard) warrior.

So fighting for social justice is now a bad thing?

[Kitteh]

What's "sjw"?

social justice (keyboard) warrior.

So fighting for social justice is now a bad thing?

I think it's a term that developed on tumblr, and so it's commonly used now to characterize the extremely strange fringe people you find on tumblr who identify as "transracial" or "transspecies" or stuff like that and claim themselves as fighting for social justice.