loudlylistening

[loudlylistening]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/19C0xdKnY2qvxcOLH3AmbT5srSzwO83WPQ5saN9mdhQU/edit?usp=sharing

Dear All,

It has come to my attention that one of your faculty members has declared academic war against trans people, leaning on her position at the university to do so. Kathleen Stock has made her own hatred of trans people more than apparent. This is seen not only in her tweets and publications in various newspaper outlets, but also in her choosing to speak at A Woman’s Place’s conference in Brighton the week before trans pride. This event is going ahead on 16th July.  She acts and speaks as though she is simply trying to understand the trans experience, but when presented with any example of such she turns her nose up, instead preferring to trust her assumptions, misinformation, and the experiences of other cis men and women.

I have made several attempts to speak with Kathleen in person on this issue, as the organisation she is speaking for claims to just want to have a “reasonable debate” about transness. Thinking this must also be what Kathleen was seeking I engaged with her first via email, but later in responding to people responding to her tweets, believing that they simply wanted a clearer understanding of the trans experience.  Unfortunately, the number of insults I received and the refusal of her followers to engage with any of my points proved my attempt at engagement to be a waste of time and energy. It also resulted in Kathleen rescinding her invitation to speak with me about the issue as she saw me as too emotional and it wasn’t “part of her job”.

Given that one of the things I wanted to talk about was her apparent misconception of what it means to be trans, and her insistence on speaking about this issue using misinformation and falsehoods, it is something that would have been accepted by anyone trying to explore the philosophy around gender and gain an accurate picture of the situation. Her intentions are to paint her own doubts about trans people as a philosophical imperative, regardless of if her narrative fuels violent transphobic attitudes and contradict the evidence we have about trans people.

The way she portrays being trans and “trans ideology” is completely disingenuous and shows her to be someone completely stuck in an echo chamber of “trans women are not women like me and also I am so oppressed by them”.  She sees trans concepts of gender identity as as basic as if someone likes pink they are a women. Whereas trans people are actually saying if you bother to listen to us is that there is nothing that makes you a girl or a boy but you, and that as a person you can relate to these concepts however you like, as long as you don’t limit anyone else’s expression/identity. For example, a person assigned female at birth who likes to wear dresses and not bind their breasts can be a man, in just identifying as a man. If they feel that their own femininity feeds into their identity as a man, that is as valid as that feeding into someone else’s identity as a woman.

Kathleen, however, seems to think she can use a trans women’s masculinity to invalidate her womanhood, whilst simultaneously criticising feminine trans women (who often have to be extra feminine to have their identity validated by the external world) as “false caricatures of womanhood” for this femininity they are forced into.

There is a complex philosophical conversation to be had about gender, but it requires you believe trans people about their experience of gender in the same way you would believe cis people. Kathleen does not do this, because she is a bigot.

What makes anyone any particular gender is self-identifying with that gender. People’s reasons for doing this vary widely, but there is no correct reason for identifying as a particular gender. We are all trapped by a language that is gendered and requires us to see ourselves in a gendered way, and this is a feeling prevalent (yet again) in both trans and cis people. We have limited control of our own internal concepts of gender and how we see ourselves within that narrative. We should all be able to express and understand that part of ourselves in any way we wish (so long as it doesn’t harm anyone), and attempting to narrate someone else’s experience in the way Kathleen does is not only ridiculous but impossible. Only the person experiencing can fully understand their own experiences. Even then, there are so many factors that affect the ability to self perceive.

The interesting philosophical conversations that stem from that include how our self-identity forms, what makes up self-identity, what makes something a gendered experience, what is the experience of gender , why gender exists, could we get to a place where gender is irrelevant and would that be positive ect. Uninteresting and unphilosophical questions include “do non binary people exist”, “are trans women real women”, “are trans men really just confused lesbians”, “do people choose identify as a women/man to have more sex”, and the answer to these and other questions vomited up by the Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists is no, and this conclusion can be reached easily by believing most trans people about their own experiences.

Trans women being women does not harm anyone in contrast to what Kathleen would have you believe.

The narrative that Woman’s Place UK and Kathleen parrot is that "trans women do harm by being women in women’s spaces because there is a chance that really they’re just a man pretending to be a women to gain access to vulnerable women". This is the most common reason Kathleen repeatedly gives for considering excluding a vulnerable group of women who are more prone to be victims of violence and domestic violence from accessing women’s resources that can be a matter of life and death.

Trans women live their lives as women and they experience misogyny as women, and so are entitled to use women’s spaces as women.

Being a women doesn’t make you a safe person. Trans women have been included in women’s spaces since the dawn of humanity. Kathleen and her ilk are painting this as a new battle against a threat that they have no examples of actually happening, whilst making no one safer, and actively harming trans people. There is an equal chance of a cis lesbian entering a women’s space to abuse other women, in that it’s very unlikely and would have nothing to do with her being a lesbian. There are abusive trans women, but being accepted as a woman isn’t going to negate any other crime you commit or behaviour you repeat. Being a trans women doesn’t make you any more likely to be abusive than any other person.

Determined to understand her philosophical perspective, I started reading through her work, and to my horror found it littered with  transphobic false assumptions, and phrases like “trans ideology” (trans people are just a diverse group as cis people) and refusing to use words like cisgender in favour of the phrase  “women who are not trans women”. Her rejection of commonly accepted standard in academic talk about being transgender in favour of more cumbersome language is just one example of her deliberately othering and rejecting trans people

Kathleen is dangerous because she misleads readers on her own view to try to steer the conversation towards doubting trans people’s genders to be valid and trying to pose that as a reasonable academic view. Kathleen thinks her own gender comes from her genitals, and although this is valid for her, her desire to impose this on literally every other person is both elitist and absurd. Kathleen doesn't seem able to acknowledge her own biases and misleads her audiences by saying she supports trans rights while deliberately and aggressively undermining them. She can't continue this pattern of behaviour unchallenged by her colleagues.

In allowing her to continue this behaviour, without a critical response from anyone but the students union, you allow her position to be accepted as just a result of academia.

This is a false narrative.

Questioning whether trans people’s genders are as valid as cis people’s is not a difference of opinion, it is bigotry. It is bigotry because she is completely unwilling to engage with anyone who disagrees with her on the issue, upholding her core unshakeable belief that trans women are not women. It is a view she attributes partially to her being a lesbian that could never be attracted to a trans  lesbian, because she insists on falsely categorising trans women as people with penises and XY chromosomes. I have pointed out to her the existence of trans women without these traits, as bodies and chromosomal makeup can vary due to factors like the chance of your genetic, surgery, Hormone replacement therapy etc.

I personally am very interested in the philosophical aspect of gender, and in standing against and encouraging others to stand against Kathleen I am not trying to limit free speech. I am trying to make it clear to you several things:

1     That Kathleen’s arguments are based on her own bigotry rather than an interest in the philosophical conversation

2    In order to have an academic conversation about gender, you do not need to include bigots or doubt people’s gender

3    In not coming forward in the face of bigotry trying to hide under academic language not only do you fail trans students, but you allow     her to continue to lean of the academic weight of being a member of your faculty and institution

Adam Tickle has called for kindness and free speech in the wake of Kathleen’s most recent comments, allowing her to feel vindicated and free to spread hatred in the guise of academia.

Kathleen’s twitter and multiple articles about the issue is flowery hatred and misinformation.

I implore you to come forward in support of trans students and staff, who very existence Kathleen is trying to bring into the field of debate.  Bigotry is not necessary for free speech. Bigotry is based not on philosophical argument, but the very feelings that so many like to discard as invalid. Bigotry can hide in academic language.

It is endlessly exhausting being a trans person who is willing to engage with those you disagree with because often you end up being completely ignored and dismissed because you are trans, but this is something I put energy into doing when I feel able. What is even more exhausting is to see a wall of silence from the Philosophy department and Sussex as a whole.

Fighting this bigotry is emotionally taxing for me because it requires engaging with arguments that directly contradict my own experience of my self. We need others to help take responsibility and make bigotry unwelcome in your spaces. This especially includes the University of Sussex.

Best Wishes,

Kai Quinn Allen