Is transgender something to get upset about?

[Immanuel Can]

This shows how blinkered you are. Do you know who is oppressing those young males?

Oh. So it's other men, is it. Well, please enlighten me: where are these "mean men"? Who are they? They must be stopped!

It's not women - it's older people (the vast majority being male) who are oppressing everyone.

Oooooh...I see. The generation that have actually made a pay check are oppressing those of us who haven't. Got it.

Then, rather than accepting the actual oppressors, certain types of Christians choose to do a little of their own oppressing of even more disempowered groups.

Please, do go on...who are these "Christians" about whom you are so "certain" who have so much power they can "oppress" all the "disempowered groups."

I'm loving this explanation. I can't wait to see how you work it out...

[Greta]

This shows how blinkered you are. Do you know who is oppressing those young males? It's not women - it's older people (the vast majority being male) who are oppressing everyone.

Oh. So it's other men, is it. Well, please enlighten me: where are these "mean men"? Who are they? They must be stopped!

Thusly, the deeply callused right hand of God speaks.

[Immanuel Can]

Thus, the deeply callused right hand of God speaks.

This, I think, is what is known as the "shiny object" defence...oh, look...over there: a distraction.

No, no, please continue with your unveiling of "patriarchy" here. I feel the need of enlightening, and clearly I need it.

You were saying something about a certain set of mean men? Old men, were they? But they were also Christians, who had tons of power in our society, and were oppressing people...

Please, please...this is too good to miss.

[Greta]

The calluses, Manny, you must have so many calluses ...



https://static.guim.co.uk/ni/1415721490 ... -chart.svg

[Immanuel Can]

https://static.guim.co.uk/ni/1415721490 ... -chart.svg

Umm...did you have a point?

I think I'm missing it here, and I doubt I'm the only one. Are you suggesting that the large line represents this "older, Christian" demographic with all he power, the one that "oppresses" people?

I'm still looking for them.

[Belinda]

Greta wrote:

I imagine a forum where all members accept some basic truths that don't have to be revisited and picked part - heliocentricism, evolution, the equivalence of the genders, that extra carbon in the atmosphere causes warming, that human sexual and gender diversity is obviously normal, and so forth. Then, from that base we could avoid revisiting the really, really obvious topics like this one and actually progress - to stimulate ideas we'd not thought of before rather than going in these faulty circles, reiterating rather than learning.

I guess you would need to go to some forum where the mean level of education is higher than these two forums.

Other point: not all Christians are bigots. I have met many churchgoers and Christians; Church of Scotland and Unitarians and also quite a few Catholics two of whom were my friends, also a few Sea of Faith, and Subud Christians. Not one of those was a bigot. True, my experience was that of only me , and my experience too is that in these forums 'Christians' are often ignorant and bigotted. My guess is that this is something about the level of people's education, especially perhaps scientific, in these forums ----not about Christianity or Christians. Also, many people here are Americans and the USA has the reputation of hosting many huge evangelical churches i.e. religiosity.

Other other point: for goodness sake Greta, don't go!

[Belinda]

Doc, regarding teaching methods and teaching experience, surely the relative educational and training components vary according to the subject being taught. If I were learning plumbing, or swimming, I'd not want to be educated I'd want to be trained. I'd want the teacher to know what level of skill I start out with. Some practical subjects for instance cookery, or photography, are best taught with some drawing-out of creativity alongside the necessary training.

If I were learning philosophy, or English literature, or empathy, I'd want not training but educating.The students have to learn from where they are at in their lives ; if not the learning is likely to be parroting set answers to pass an exam.

In primary schools the training and the education are quite mixed up together. For instance teaching a small child to tie the laces of her trainers is probably mostly training although if the kid is stroppy she will need some education (or maybe a rest or something) before the training is much benefit to her.

[uwot]

This shows how blinkered you are. Do you know who is oppressing those young males?

Oh. So it's other men, is it. Well, please enlighten me: where are these "mean men"? Who are they? They must be stopped!

Yes they must. Religious texts are nearly always written by men. The Torah, bible and Koran all insist we should be ashamed of our bodily functions and demand that the foreskin of males is removed. This is largely ignored in Europe, but is still inflicted on most boys in the USA*. The only function this procedure serves is to make masturbating more difficult and sex less pleasurable.
Then there's the military. Men with political, often religious, ambitions will commit men younger and fitter than themselves to achieving their objectives by getting killed.

It's not women - it's older people (the vast majority being male) who are oppressing everyone.

Oooooh...I see. The generation that have actually made a pay check are oppressing those of us who haven't. Got it.

The aim of capitalism is to maximise profits, so that those with capital make more capital. This is done by making people work as hard as possible, for as little as possible. When capitalists hold political power, they invariably introduce laws that protect their ability to do the above and if the law doesn't suit them, they simply move production to somewhere the law suits them better.

Then, rather than accepting the actual oppressors, certain types of Christians choose to do a little of their own oppressing of even more disempowered groups.

Please, do go on...who are these "Christians" about whom you are so "certain" who have so much power they can "oppress" all the "disempowered groups."

I'm loving this explanation. I can't wait to see how you work it out...

It is obvious to anyone who isn't a complete idiot.

*"Data from a national survey conducted from 1999 to 2002 found that the overall prevalence of male circumcision in the United States was 79%. 91% of boys born in the 1970s, and 83% of boys born in the 1980s were circumcised. An earlier survey, conducted in 1992, found a circumcision prevalence of 77% in US-born men, born from 1932–1974, including 81% of non-Hispanic White men, 65% of Black men, and 54% of Hispanic men, vs. 42% of non U.S. born men who were circumcised."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prevalenc ... rcumcision

[Hobbes' Choice]

Yes they must. Religious texts are nearly always written by men. The Torah, bible and Koran all insist we should be ashamed of our bodily functions and demand that the foreskin of males is removed. This is largely ignored in Europe, but is still inflicted on most boys in the USA*. The only function this procedure serves is to make masturbating more difficult and sex less pleasurable.

This has always been the weirdest religious obsession as far as I am concerned; sex, and nudity.
God made us all naked and commands us to be clothed. He gives us urges and demands we suppress them. He gives us feelings and demands we control them.
Then he points out that the body he has designed is faulty and demands we abuse out babies and cut bits off of them.

Circumscision is the closest thing we have to a genuine Jewish conspiracy, nearly all boys in the USA were regularly and routinely chopped about on the altar of "hygene", when all the evidence demands that keeping the foreskin is more healthy.
In effect it makes ejaculation more difficult by desensitising the penis.