my kids are all in their twenties and in the thick of it. this bullshit is the sea they swim in. i just feel very glad they aren't younger. it's aggressively pushed in nz even in preschools. we government fund and affirm transition in nz.
my kids are all in their twenties and in the thick of it. this bullshit is the sea they swim in. i just feel very glad they aren't younger. it's aggressively pushed in nz even in preschools. we government fund and affirm transition in nz.
Sorry to hear that your older son is the one most badly affected. Whole issue clearly tears up a lot of families -- those responsible need to be held to account, to say the least.
But a major part of the problem is, as Francis Bacon put it some 400 years ago, that "shoddy and inept uses of words lay siege to the intellect in wondrous ways". We seem incapable of defining our categories with the requisite degree of precision and intellectual honesty. I found an oldish essay at Psychology Today to provide some useful perspectives, and an avenue into the issue. A salient quote or two:
PT: "None of this categorizing is a problem unless we start insisting that these categories are deeply reflective of external nature. It’s not, we like to think, that some categories are just useful, or helpful, or shorthand filing systems admitting of exceptions—but that they are essences built into the very fabric of reality."
Closer to home, for both of us, you might "enjoy" my post on "Statistics Departments Corrupted by Gender Ideology" -- both New Zealand's and Canada's own:
Of particular if infamous note relative to NZ's is this bit:
NZ Stats: "Sex reassignment occurs where a person has undergone the necessary treatment to permanently change their sex. If a person's sex is indeterminate at birth, sex assignment occurs when they undergo treatment to become male or female."
Rank bloody insanity when our Statistics Departments, supposedly gatekeepers on scientific principles and literacy, are peddling such claptrap. I had submitted a lengthy essay to Canada's -- paid several hundred bucks for editing services -- in response to their "call for consultation" -- Google Docs link in the post -- which had exhibited similar levels of that.
No response yet of course, crickets, so had planned on contacting the Minister in charge; those responsible should be fired, if not hung, drawn and quartered -- figuratively speaking of course ... 🙂 But really seriously chaps my hide; I expect that is even more so for those with more "skin in the game".
PT: "For the last three hundred years or so, the advance of science has been in lockstep with the insight that is what really exists are processes, not essences."
But kind of set me back on my heels when I first read it. It had initially been deleted -- after some transactivists got their knickers in a twist -- but PT eventually, after some objections, found their spines and republished it.
my kids are all in their twenties and in the thick of it. this bullshit is the sea they swim in. i just feel very glad they aren't younger. it's aggressively pushed in nz even in preschools. we government fund and affirm transition in nz.
Sorry to hear that your older son is the one most badly affected. Whole issue clearly tears up a lot of families -- those responsible need to be held to account, to say the least.
But a major part of the problem is, as Francis Bacon put it some 400 years ago, that "shoddy and inept uses of words lay siege to the intellect in wondrous ways". We seem incapable of defining our categories with the requisite degree of precision and intellectual honesty. I found an oldish essay at Psychology Today to provide some useful perspectives, and an avenue into the issue. A salient quote or two:
PT: "None of this categorizing is a problem unless we start insisting that these categories are deeply reflective of external nature. It’s not, we like to think, that some categories are just useful, or helpful, or shorthand filing systems admitting of exceptions—but that they are essences built into the very fabric of reality."
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/hive-mind/202003/terf-wars-what-is-biological-sex
Closer to home, for both of us, you might "enjoy" my post on "Statistics Departments Corrupted by Gender Ideology" -- both New Zealand's and Canada's own:
https://humanuseofhumanbeings.substack.com/p/statistics-departments-corrupted
Of particular if infamous note relative to NZ's is this bit:
NZ Stats: "Sex reassignment occurs where a person has undergone the necessary treatment to permanently change their sex. If a person's sex is indeterminate at birth, sex assignment occurs when they undergo treatment to become male or female."
Rank bloody insanity when our Statistics Departments, supposedly gatekeepers on scientific principles and literacy, are peddling such claptrap. I had submitted a lengthy essay to Canada's -- paid several hundred bucks for editing services -- in response to their "call for consultation" -- Google Docs link in the post -- which had exhibited similar levels of that.
No response yet of course, crickets, so had planned on contacting the Minister in charge; those responsible should be fired, if not hung, drawn and quartered -- figuratively speaking of course ... 🙂 But really seriously chaps my hide; I expect that is even more so for those with more "skin in the game".
thank you. i will read. canada and nz are ground zero for this crap.
that psychology today quote rocks
Some rather brilliant insights therein -- like:
PT: "For the last three hundred years or so, the advance of science has been in lockstep with the insight that is what really exists are processes, not essences."
But kind of set me back on my heels when I first read it. It had initially been deleted -- after some transactivists got their knickers in a twist -- but PT eventually, after some objections, found their spines and republished it.