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Friday, April 22, 2016

Identity — Gender Or Otherwise

Is there anything such as truth anymore, or is everything relative and a matter of perception?

85 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. Of course, but your definition of "Reality" may be entirely different from my definition, or Obama's definition, or Ann Coulter's, or Spike Lee's, etc.

      "Normal" is what the majority of people in any given culture SAY it is.

      Delete
  2. "Hello, I'm Timothy Leary and this... is my world."

    ReplyDelete
  3. Once you buy into "subjectivity", you also need to recognize the Lacanian principle of "Otherness", lest you erroneously believe that everyone else is the same as you (cultural relativism).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. “Hermaphroditic our culture’s becoming,”
      said Leslie to Shirley, while chatting at tea.
      “Unisex Toilets, Ambiguous Hairstyles
      Are very confusing,” said both MEN to me!


      ~ FreeThinke

      Delete
    2. FT,
      Onesie unisex toilets (or family bathrooms) are no big deal as far as I'm concerned.

      But community bathrooms and locker rooms should be accessed according to biological gender, IMO.

      What is forcing communities and schools to comply with this transgender agenda is Title IX, which provides federal funds. "Discriminate" against transgenders -- and federal funds are cut off.

      Delete
    3. No, no, no... we need to redesign all of the world's toilets so as to best accommodate fluid gender identities...

      Delete
    4. This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete
    5. There is a Master and there are "hysterical" subjects.

      Subjectivity...REQUIRES a MASTER.

      Delete
    6. Citizens are NO ONE's "Subjects". They must ACT as their OWN MASTERS, regardless of the "feelings" of "other" citizens. Otherwise the slaves rule... as is the case in the "transgender" argument.

      Delete
  4. Replies
    1. Time for THEM (transexuals, gays, etc.) to put on Bergman's Persona!

      Delete
    2. Zizek is wrong –– at least where it pertains to me. I very frankly am having the time of my life.

      I believe we can –– and should –– be as happy we make up our minds to be. We can never change the world, but be CAN change the way we CHOOSE to RESPOND to it.

      However, we can NEVER change the OTHERS choose to respond to US.

      I caught the wisdom embedded in Horace Walpole's pithy quotation many years ago.

      "Life is a tragedy to him who FEELS, but a comedy to him who THINKS."

      The way I have put it most often is this: Life is a paradox, –– something that is so absurd it should not be possible, but it does ––, so accept it as a gift, and do your best to make the most of it come what may.

      In reality we have no other choice, so why choose to be mad and sad all the time, because we do not, cannot and never will have the power to refashion the world to suit ourselves.

      THAT, incidentally is the primary flaw in every variation of Utopian-Marxian-Collectivist-Communitarian-Flowerchildian ideology –– a dogged,–– frankly stupid ––, determination to coerce Reality into being something it was never meant to be.

      Delete
    3. However, we can NEVER change the OTHERS choose to respond to US.
      -----------

      It my be instructive to look at th career of Prince.

      Now myself, I'm first and foremost a film guy and he tried his hand at film and stunk it up, badly.
      I can't say much for his music either. That signature song, Purple Rain seems like a lot of adolescent noodling to me.

      But he, like David Bowie, was brilliant at dictating his persona. He was insistent that people respond to his apparent androgyny.

      Delete
    4. Duck,
      He was insistent that people respond to his apparent androgyny.

      Because?

      Why is it so important to accept androgyny as normal? Is androgyny normal?

      What percentage of the population is naturally androgynous?

      Delete
    5. MAKE Prince pick a gender... and HARASS him if he chooses an "improper" one. :)

      Delete
    6. If he doesn't adopt a culturally acceptable "persona", F HIM!

      Delete
    7. ...but somehow I've a feeling that it will be the "professionals" who will become the impetus behind the renaming.

      Delete
    8. All of this sidesteps the verifiable fact that there are pathetic people in the world that should be actively encouraged to commit suicide.

      Delete
  5. The Statue of Liberty's gender
    'Snot clear. I fear "she" 'sa pretender.
    Hordes of kids –– and the press! ––
    Have been up in her dress,
    And found nothing to goose or surrender!


    ~ FreeThinke -

    Written in 1986 in honor of the Lady's 100th Anniversary in New York Harbor

    ReplyDelete
  6. ____________ After Lolita ____________

    Each thought is little but a stale cliché, as
    Lolita, bored coquette too early jaded,
    Leaves despondency to dominate the day, as
    Coarseness makes buds wither –– too soon faded.

    Intellectual acumen stands
    Helpless, frozen, gibbering at the sight
    Of nascent beauty whose awakening glands
    Mock unconsciously the Victim’s plight.

    Society won’t see that tragedy
    It’s not what happens to the adolescent,
    But rather that a soul died helplessly
    Before a feral instinct recrudescent.

    The Siren’s ancient power still may lure
    Free men to become slaves to the impure.


    ~ FreeThinke

    ReplyDelete
  7. ______ Grandeur of a Sort ______

    Grandeur of a sort so rarely seen
    Nostrils flare and eyebrows start to raise.
    Under no constraint to withhold praise
    Harridans and hustlers turn pea green.

    Ladies feel the breath stop in their throats;
    Looking fixedly at everywhere,
    Except the spot where others gape and stare,
    While he who has it calmly stands and gloats.

    Ogleworthy ones have special rights
    Sparking fights whenever they wear tights.

    Still they occupy a favored space
    Inimitable, above the commonplace

    Exhibiting most coveted delights
    Half pityingly as they gaze down from the heights.



    ~ FreeThinke

    ReplyDelete
  8. An inspection obstetrical cursory

    Once consigned a girl to a blue nursery
    
And all of her toys
    Were intended for boys.

    Could you ever imagine a worse story?




    ~ FreeThinke

    ReplyDelete
  9. A prominent, popular thespian

    Named "Rock" really wanted to be "Leslie Anne"

    So he went through much strife

    Going under the knife,

    But he thinks now that he's a Male Lesbian!


    ~ FreeThinke

    ReplyDelete
  10. There once was a fellow named Tom,

    Who wanted to be someone's Mom.
    
Despite earnest coition

    Naught came to fruition,
    
So he adopted a child without qualm!


    ~ FreeThinke

    ReplyDelete
  11. On SHE-MALES in the BOYS ROOM

    If the creature has a dick.
    
(S)he's pulled a dirty trick.
    He(r) agenda makes me sick.

    

If (s)he had it vivisected,

    (S)he may be misdirected,
    But as "girl" must be accepted.
    


    Think of the loss of poise

    That would be shown by boys

    To see a fellow male without his toys!


    ~ The Vice Versifier

    ReplyDelete
  12. 'It isn't crap or mindless pap

    That's featured here today, I say

    'Tis wind from those who've sinned

    That's set alight to show the way.



    'Tis better that we venture thus
    
Upon a foolish lark

    Than tap away the livelong day
    
Cursing at the dark.



    The Black Knight picked to rule us

    Has befouled all Dee Cee
    
Oozing pus, he cannot fool us

    Yet from him we can't shake free.



    And so to keep the chill at bay
    
Our flatulence we light

    'Tis but one way that spirits gay
    Endure the Endless Night.


    

~ Swifton Dedleigh

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. With the abandonment of the Western Canon went all pretense of maintaining Western Enlightened values and standards.

      Now Rigoberta Manchu can be Shakespeare and Maya Angelou Ben Johnson... we just need to make sex and skin colour civilization's most determinant cultural factors...

      Delete
    2. Egg-ZACK-Kee, FJ!

      Egg-ZAC K-Lee!!!!!

      };^)>

      Delete
  13. "It's not my place to draw lines or boundaries." I hope she doesn't become a mother!

    I kept looking for the line around the head where the top had been opened and the brain removed. Can we raise the voting age to, say, 45?

    As Mrs. Gooch (our local, purist health grocer until bought out by WF) once printed on her sacks: People who think all vitamins are alike will probably fall for anything.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Baysider,
      "It's not my place to draw lines or boundaries." I hope she doesn't become a mother!

      Or a pet owner.

      These young people in the video -- most of them, anyway -- have been brainwashed. I know of know other way to put it.

      Delete
    2. ALL of the "stewdents" interviewed seemed "spaced out," as though living in a weird kind of Commjunity-Induced trance.

      The females appeared silly, hopelessly immature, and essentially mindless.

      The males looked and sounded for all the world as though they'd been subjected to chemical or physical castration in early adolescence.

      It gets harder and harder to relate to each new generation as fellow human beings.

      Proof that we ARE –– or certainly BECOME –– what we've been CONDITIONED to BELIEVE we are.

      These pathetic young people have obviously been miseducated morally and intellectually, –– and not at ALL spiritually ––, to think, feel and behave like airheads.

      For this I'm afraid we have no one to thank but LEFTIST ACTIVISTS –– and our complacent, indolent SELVES for letting our children fall prey to CULTURAL MARXISM and MASS COMMUNICATION disseminated through a perverse, even depraved Information Industry, Entertainment,–– Movies, Popular Music, Radio, TV, and now the Internet and SmartPhones.

      Delete
    3. FT,
      I largely agree -- although not on all points.

      Regardless, decades of Cultiral Marxism are now reaping the whirlwind.

      Western Civilization is spiraling downward. And I suppose that masses of Westerners are cheering as they watch their own destruction.

      Delete
    4. Our hope lies in the individual's ever present opportunity to engage in Prayer, Meditation, Introspection, the earnest study of Fine, Brilliant, Good and UPLIFTING things, –– and to STOP looking for "RESCUE" from sources OUTSIDE himself.

      Only God can save us from ourselves, and the only way we can reach Him is through what-I-call "practical mysticism" and a determination to do as much good for others as we possibly can –– no matter what.

      Just for the record I think you are a person who lives that way, yourself. My only criticism of you is your seeming unwillingness to give yourself sufficient credit for the many fine things you do at home and at work –– and here as well.

      Delete
    5. "If a man is going to dress as a woman and enter a rest room to molest someone he could do that now and it would be just as illegal with or without the law."

      Only now the pervert can sue you for not letting him have the opportunity to molest you. In a more ironic twist, rock stars can not be sued into performing at venues where cross-dressing perverts are banned from restrooms if such a thing violates their religion or conscience.

      You may want to spread the word in your "community" that Texas didn't run out of tow chains.

      Delete
  14. The respondents in the video appear to believe that neither objective truth nor boundaries exist. How did the popular culture of the 21st Century reach the point of this ludicrous juncture?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I've been trying to explain that to the readers over and over and over and over again for YEARS, AOW. I'm sure I know, but no one wants to believe me.

      T wo words cover it pretty well:

      CULTURAL MARXISM

      And all the evil and ugliness it has spawned.

      Cultural Marxism should probably be labeled The Doctrine of the Anti-Christ.

      Delete
  15. AOW...I was sorry the subject completely changed from allowing all genders in the same bathroom to "if I were to say I'm Chinese.." What's the connection? It weakened his point badly.

    The only thing that cheered me in the responses was the incessant giggling every time they gave one of their answers...seems to me THEY know how ridiculous they sound....
    How did popular culture reach the ludicrous juncture of men being allowed in the bathroom of little girls? Good question.
    The little girls are complaining and fearful but the LGBT folks trump the fears of the girls, I guess.
    That's not only stupid but it's unkind and dangerous.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Z,
      I was sorry the subject completely changed from allowing all genders in the same bathroom to "if I were to say I'm Chinese.." What's the connection?

      To show how absurd our culture has become -- to the point that objective truth has gone down the drain.

      I can say all day long, "I drive an Escalade." But the truth is that I drive a Hyundai.

      Delete
    2. yes, I see that now....I was thinking the subject was gender but it's all about identity; sorry about that!!

      Delete
    3. I feel better about myself when I pretend to drive an Escalade... everyone should frive a Government Motors car...

      Self Esteem ROCKS! Reality is SUCH a bummer!

      Delete
    4. Stop SHAMING me! Get out of my SAFE SPACE!

      Delete
  16. From what I understand, this transgender issue goes beyond restrooms.

    See this 2016 article from the LA Times: Transgender student's use of locker room causes stir at San Diego high school and this 2016 article from the Chicago Tribune: Transgender student who fought District 211 gets locker room access.

    From the latter:

    The complaint, filed with the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights, triggered an investigation and an unprecedented decision in November that the district had violated Title IX, the federal law that bans discrimination on the basis of sex. The district risked losing millions of federal dollars and a possible lawsuit if it failed to reach a resolution.

    To find the above, I did a Google search using the search terms "transgenders in locker rooms" (without the quotation marks).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. As I read it, the kids are not having a problem but it's the parents who insist on freaking out. About as expected.

      Delete
    2. Knowledge (even of self-identity) requires the exercise of "power" to hold it in place. University officials have abdicated their "in loco parentis" responsibilities... so YEAH, the PARENTS must be the BAD POWERFUL GUYS who FREAK OUT!

      The University Discourse in a democracy has no MASTER (King). Parents PAY the BILLS, and in a consumer society THEY ARE THE MASTERS.

      Delete
    3. Duck,
      As I read it, the kids are not having a problem but it's the parents who insist on freaking out.

      Not so sure about that. Some of the kids have indeed spoken out. Others, so I've heard via the grapevine not on the web, are afraid to speak out for concern about jeopardizing their GPA.

      Delete
    4. Thersites,
      Parents PAY the BILLS, and in a consumer society THEY ARE THE MASTERS.

      Bingo!

      Delete
    5. Makes you wonder about the values eventually adopted by a consumer society, doesn't it?

      Delete
    6. If you can accept a "multiplicity" of values, you can avoid becoming an obsessive neo-liberal control freak like Bernie Sanders. :)

      Democratic socialism is a plea for a "consumer controlled" society... because "the Customer is ALWAYS right" and needs to be in charge of ALL the "products" available in the marketplace (which must mean EVERYWHERE in the UNIVERSE).

      Delete
  17. This March 2016 essay in the Seattle Times nails it:

    What really happens when transgender person uses locker room:

    A FEW months ago, the state of Washington decided to allow people to choose locker rooms based on an internal sense of whether they are male or female instead of sticking with the longstanding, sensible practice of designating locker rooms for use by men or women based on clear biological realities. So it should come as no surprise that a man walked into the women’s and girls’ locker room to change at a public pool on Feb. 8.

    When the man walked in to undress, the locker room was occupied by women and members of a girls’ swim team, presumably in various states of undress. Quite understandably, some of them “became alarmed” and complained to the Seattle Parks and Recreation staff. Although the man said “the law has changed and I have a right to be here,” the staff asked him to leave the women’s locker room, which he did.

    So, was the man allowed to be in the women’s locker room or was he not? Seattle Parks and Recreation issued a statement suggesting that the man would not have been asked to leave if he had simply verbally identified as a woman.


    The essay concludes with this paragraph:

    Ultimately, when it comes to undressing in front of others, it shouldn’t matter whether a person verbally identifies as male or female. Such verbal statements don’t change biological facts. But state bureaucrats have turned a blind eye to rubber-meets-the-road realities and entered the land of make believe. Regrettably, the price Washington women and girls are already paying for this fantasy is far from imaginary.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Cambridge has had a law for over 20 years allowing transexuals to use the bathroom of choice and there has not been a reported incident of assault in that time.
      Other cities and states with the same law have not had a reported incident either.

      I think there is a great deal of over reaction here.

      Delete
    2. http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Man-Dressed-as-Woman-Spies-Into-Mall-Bathroom-Stall-in-Virginia-Police-Say-332934761.html

      http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Man-Dressed-as-Woman-Arrested-for-Spying-Into-Mall-Bathroom-Stall-Police-Say-351232041.html

      http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2016/04/01/california-man-dressed-woman-busted-videoing-womens-bathroom/

      https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/man-dressed-as-a-woman-peeps-on-women-in-bathroom-at-wal-mart/2015/06/10/cd88e1d6-0f5a-11e5-a0dc-2b6f404ff5cf_story.htmlhttp://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Man-Dressed-as-Woman-Spies-Into-Mall-Bathroom-Stall-in-Virginia-Police-Say-332934761.html

      http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Man-Dressed-as-Woman-Arrested-for-Spying-Into-Mall-Bathroom-Stall-Police-Say-351232041.html

      http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2016/04/01/california-man-dressed-woman-busted-videoing-womens-bathroom/

      https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/man-dressed-as-a-woman-peeps-on-women-in-bathroom-at-wal-mart/2015/06/10/cd88e1d6-0f5a-11e5-a0dc-2b6f404ff5cf_story.html

      Delete
    3. http://zeenews.india.com/news/videos/dna/dna-isis-terrorists-dress-as-women-in-attempt-to-flee-battlefield%E2%80%8F_1563318.html

      Delete
    4. http://m.jpost.com/Middle-East/ISIS-fighters-dress-as-women-in-desperate-attempt-to-flee-battlefield-394060#article=6021MDRBOEIyQTJCOEQwQ0MwNUI4MTJCNDVGMzlCRkE0NDU=

      Delete
    5. What's to prevent a man from dressing as a woman and entering the rest room regardless?

      Your lists are irrelevant.

      There haven't been any instances of assault by trans gendered individuals using a public rest room.

      Delete
    6. We need to make sure the men dressing as women to enter a women's restroom are not perverts, molesters, peeping toms, or terrorists before we give a pass and say "don't worry, it's just Bruce Jenner."

      Delete
    7. If a man is going to dress as a woman and enter a rest room to molest someone he could do that now and it would be just as illegal with or without the law.

      As for terrorists, quit wetting yourself.

      Delete
    8. Sounds like we need to register transgenders and establish a police department to monitor their bathroom access (show your "transgender badge" to the cop at the bathroom door).

      Register transgenders NOT guns!

      Delete
    9. To ducky's argument... Ooooops....

      5 transgenders who abused their bathroom privileges.

      Registration WON'T be enough!

      Delete
    10. You'd have to compare the frequency of transgender bathroom attacks with same-sex attacks to see whether the transgender issue makes any difference. I'd guess that the most prevalent form of attack is against transgenders who draw attention to themselves by visiting a bathroom for a gender other than the one they present as.

      Delete
    11. I identify as "canine". So long as I curb myself and bag it, why not let me use public parks as a bathroom? And if you object to my public bathroom behavior, you must be an animal hater.

      Delete
    12. More about my plight...

      ps - How DARE the Dr. imply that my lifestyle isn't as fulfilling as any humans...

      Delete
  18. Kid,
    Surreal, isn't it?

    Being threatened by chalk -- that defies a printable comment.

    ReplyDelete
  19. It's hard for Universities to teach kids to be this stupid... but evidently, they ARE succeeding.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Joe,
    I wonder how the objectives are stated so that professors conform.

    ReplyDelete
  21. They're called "Affirmative Action" hiring targets...

    ReplyDelete
  22. They who would upon the negative bear down
    Seem quite unaware they play the clown.

    Expressing disapproval is insidious.
    By dwelling always on the false and hideous

    They easily obscure the good within our grasp,
    And to their breast instead, an asp they clasp.


    ~ FreeThinke

    ”... [W]hatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.”

    ~ Philippians 4:8 - King James Version

    We could never hope to receive better advice than that.

    ~ FreeThinke

    ReplyDelete
  23. Posting rhyme's a waste of time
    Since no one comes to read it.
    The idea is to prevent crime,
    But not a soul will heed it.

    I must admit the dearth of wit
    Here in the blogosphere
    From where I sit could cause a fit
    If I got lit, my dear.

    The dullness and the weariness
    Could make one lose one's mind,
    If one allowed the dreariness
    One's soul to mincemeat grind.


    ~ FreeThinke

    ReplyDelete

  24. __ Ode on the Recent Banning __ 
    of Public Nudity in San Francisco


    Oh what's the harm in being nude,
    If no one's viewed while getting screwed?
    Though natural, that would be too crude,
    Even if one's not a prude.

    Every father –– every mother ––
    Possesses one thing –– or another ––
    As does every sister, brother,
    So why the fuss, the muss, the bother?

    As long as brother's made like dad,
    And sister has what mother had,
    There's no call to be sad or mad,
    In fact it should make most feel glad.

    If parts got switched, then there'd be cause
    For consternation –– not applause ––
    So, I guess at least should be one clause
    Or two within a township's laws

    Restricting what may be displayed 
    On side streets, park grounds, on parade,
    In sunshine, rain, in light or shade
    Deterred, not just deferred, delayed.

    For most folks shy away from freaks,
    And soon react with piercing shrieks,
    And then there are the gawking geeks,
    And those who publicly take leaks!

    And then, comparison of size,
    While never wise, engenders sighs,
    Besides, the sight of flabby thighs
    Might gag reflexes energize!

    And so, since mobs are rarely quiet,
    And many fatties will not diet,
    Would-be voyeurs will not buy it.
    So, just stay clothed. Why start a riot?


    ~ Unohoo };^)>

    ReplyDelete
  25. I can't find the site, but their have already been peeping toms who have filmed women going to the bathroom. Locker rooms next. What happened to critical thinking?

    ReplyDelete
  26. There's a new restaurant opening in June in London. This restaurant has a waiting list of 24,000.

    What's special about this restaurant? Nude dining. No photography allowed.

    From the above link:

    ...London’s Bunyadi restaurant opens in June and personifies the meaning of the word “natural” by liberating patrons from phones, electric lights — and clothing.

    According to the restaurant’s website, patrons “will dine under a canopy of candle lights, creatively partitioned with bamboo and wicker, as they recline on wood-hewn furniture.” Not only is the setting and ambiance natural, so is the food. The restaurant will be serving home-grown food and edible cutlery.

    “The idea is to experience true liberation,” said founder Seb Lyall in a press release. “People should get the chance to enjoy and experience a night out without any impurities: no chemicals, no artificial colors, no electricity, no gas, no phone and even no clothes if they wish to.”...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh dear! Apparently, there will NOT always be an England. Prince Charles is such a stuffy, hare-brained weakling he will probably adbdefecate the Throne within moments after his Mama passes on, and turn all the Royal residences into Theme Parks –– or donate them to the Islamists.

      Delete
  27. "... as they recline on wood-hewn furniture."
    ------
    Splinters?

    ReplyDelete
  28. Kid, as usual I agree with you, but I wouldn't call them "stupid." The problem is their having been willfully, deliberately MISLED and MISEDUCATED by lackadaisical, disengaged parents who carelessly accepted a corrupt educational system that at times almost seems Demon-Possessed.

    We call this "dumbing down" –– itself hateful, degrading, illiterate term –– and one of the worst things ever to befall us.

    I blame this almost solely on the insidious, totally rotten influence of Cultural Marxists and sociopathic perverts like Herbert Marcuse, Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Susan Sontag and many others who infiltrated our universities and injected mental, moral, spiritual and social CANCER into the Collective Consciousness of the Nation.

    ReplyDelete

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