A Strong Case

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6czRFLs5JQo

Not sure that I want to endorse the characterisation of Alice Dreger contained in this video, whose book is clearly written in good-faith by a person totally without the kind of mindset that leads one to want to "trigger PC cucks", but in this video, 'Contra'/Natalie makes a convincing case that: a) Ray Blanchard's typology for transwomen is off the mark (she argues this in recognition of the purpose of a reductive typology, which can be diagnostically powerful even if they misfire); and b) there is a perfectly legitimate possibility for a conceptualisation of the psychology of gender-transitioning that neither involves a mystical gender essentialism nor Blanchard's typology. She contends, in superficial agreement with Blanchard, that there are two recognisable fuzzy categories of trans women, in terms of sexuality and life history, but that Blanchard's second category does not really map onto "Cluster B" (in her terminology) at all. (It appears that she does believe that a lot of transwomen ("Cluster A") fit the description of being, in their former lives, very effeminate homosexual men, although she suggests that thinking of their motivations for transitioning as almost entirely sexual is way off the mark.) As I interpret her video, the nutshell of her opposition is this: even if sexuality is involved in motivations, as it always is with adults (and yes, probably most transwomen have a strong preference for being a female-presenting person in a sexual context), nobody is going to make the very drastic, daunting and life-changing decision to transition - it's an extremely scary thing to do - without a high degree of dysphoria. And nobody experiences debilitating dysphoria just because of sexual dissatisfaction, even if extreme.

(Note that I have read Michael Bailey's book (years ago, via a PDF online) and Dreger's book (which I spent money on (I thought it was ok and definitely broadly agreed with the thesis that justice activism does not require one to abandon the scientific mindset and a reverent attitude towards the Truth (I mean, in a sense, this idea is just Deweyan)). Note also that I think that Contra, like her fellow self-identified Youtube "SJW" "Shaun" (Shaun and Jen), tends to steelman 'leftists' way too much (put clever and nuanced beliefs in the mouths of ordinary folks without the intellectual sophistication they have). I cannot get on board intellectually or emotionally with their "SJW"/"leftist" tribalism. For example, I hate the fact that Contra in this video identifies as a "Postmodernist" when, as she soon clarifies, she still believes in striving for objective truth and the epistemic authority of bona fide science and simply thinks that Bailey does not practise good science. It is so bizarre to me to signal identification with the tribe of "Postmodernists" if this is what you believe, because non-reactionary people who rail against Postmodernism and Postmodernists (like me or Chomsky: http://bactra.org/chomsky-on-postmodernism.html or Nussbaum: http://faculty.georgetown.edu/irvinem/theory/Nussbaum-Butler-Critique-NR-2-99.pdf) are not talking about people like this at all! This kind of tribal signalling is pernicious! It is also sad to me that those two seem to be happily tribally affiliated with the PhilosophyTube guy, whom I find to be embarrassingly incompetent and irrational, and also that they are part of the gang of people who like to call everything bad in the world "Capitalism" for some reason (this is another pernicious tribal thing).)