While I've always believed that Dr. Christine Blasey Ford was telling the truth about being assaulted as a teen, I am much less confident that she actually believed her allegations against Brett Kavanaugh were true. To a large segment of the population, the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to replace Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court constituted an existential threat to the reproductive rights of women. I find it very easy to believe that a woman that would under normal circumstances never make a false allegation against an innocent man nor ever give perjured testimony before Congress, might see it as her duty to do what she could to protect a woman's right to choose. It may be that her testimony was completely true and that Kavanaugh participated in a horrible crime as a high school student that should have disqualified him from being a judge, much less a Supreme Court Justice. Perhaps, he was so supportive of his female clerks because he felt so guilty about what he had done. But given that there was no objective evidence they had ever met, that she couldn't even give the date she was allegedly assaulted making it impossible for Kavanaugh to prove he wasn't there, and that there was significant motive for her to lie, I don't believe her allegations should have kept him off the Court.
As for the issue of whether a transgender woman is really a woman or really a man, I have to agree with Professor Goldblatt. Just because a man feels like he is really a woman on the inside does not make him a woman. Whether gender dysphoria is categorized as an emotional disturbance or a mental illness, objective reality is different from their preferred gender identity. But just because their feelings do not reflect reality doesn't mean the polite decent thing to do isn't to treat them as the gender with which they identify. A transgender person doesn't have the right to force a person to treat them that way, but under most circumstances nothing productive is served by arguing with a transgender person that they are not the gender they believe themselves to be. I think that is the position that John was staking out. But there are situations where objective reality is important. Transgender women seeking to compete in women's sports is one area where reality matters. Locker rooms are another. Women and girls should not be compelled to share a locker room with a biological male. Female prison inmates should not be housed with transgender female inmates with working reproductive organs. There are inmates in Washington State that have been sexually assaulted by biological males that identify as women.
The problem with transgender activists is that they consider anyone that believes that there is a difference between a transgender woman and a biological woman is a trans-phobic bigot. Everyone, especially transgender youth, deserve to be treated with compassion, understanding, and respect. I think that usually means treating them as the gender they identify as, but there are times when objective reality must be taken into account.
While I've always believed that Dr. Christine Blasey Ford was telling the truth about being assaulted as a teen, I am much less confident that she actually believed her allegations against Brett Kavanaugh were true. To a large segment of the population, the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to replace Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court constituted an existential threat to the reproductive rights of women. I find it very easy to believe that a woman that would under normal circumstances never make a false allegation against an innocent man nor ever give perjured testimony before Congress, might see it as her duty to do what she could to protect a woman's right to choose. It may be that her testimony was completely true and that Kavanaugh participated in a horrible crime as a high school student that should have disqualified him from being a judge, much less a Supreme Court Justice. Perhaps, he was so supportive of his female clerks because he felt so guilty about what he had done. But given that there was no objective evidence they had ever met, that she couldn't even give the date she was allegedly assaulted making it impossible for Kavanaugh to prove he wasn't there, and that there was significant motive for her to lie, I don't believe her allegations should have kept him off the Court.
As for the issue of whether a transgender woman is really a woman or really a man, I have to agree with Professor Goldblatt. Just because a man feels like he is really a woman on the inside does not make him a woman. Whether gender dysphoria is categorized as an emotional disturbance or a mental illness, objective reality is different from their preferred gender identity. But just because their feelings do not reflect reality doesn't mean the polite decent thing to do isn't to treat them as the gender with which they identify. A transgender person doesn't have the right to force a person to treat them that way, but under most circumstances nothing productive is served by arguing with a transgender person that they are not the gender they believe themselves to be. I think that is the position that John was staking out. But there are situations where objective reality is important. Transgender women seeking to compete in women's sports is one area where reality matters. Locker rooms are another. Women and girls should not be compelled to share a locker room with a biological male. Female prison inmates should not be housed with transgender female inmates with working reproductive organs. There are inmates in Washington State that have been sexually assaulted by biological males that identify as women.
The problem with transgender activists is that they consider anyone that believes that there is a difference between a transgender woman and a biological woman is a trans-phobic bigot. Everyone, especially transgender youth, deserve to be treated with compassion, understanding, and respect. I think that usually means treating them as the gender they identify as, but there are times when objective reality must be taken into account.