“Trans women are women.”
Two things about this pushed me off a cliff and down the road of reading a bunch of anti-woke traditional liberals/leftists (e.g., Neiman, Haidt, Mounk, et al. ): First, as a person trained in the philosophy of language in the Anglo-American analytic tradition, Wittgenstein informs my view of language. Consequently, the idea of imposing a definition on a word inconsistent with the popular definition is incoherent. Words derive meaning from their use. While this is an active process (words’ meanings can evolve over time), insisting that a word means what it plainly doesn’t mean for >95% of the people using it makes no sense. The logic of the definition of “woman” is that it stands in for the class “biological human females,” and no amount of browbeating or counterargument can change that. While words evolve, we have no examples of changing a word intentionally to mean something close to its opposite.
https://www.reddit.com/r/IntellectualDarkWeb/comments/1gwomae/okay_i_was_wrong/
I think trans people should have all human rights, but the rights of one person end where others begin. Thus, I think that Orwellian requests to change the language, as well as places where there are legitimate interests of public policy (e.g., trans people in sport, women’s-only spaces, health care for trans kids), should be open for good faith discussion
Completely agree.
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