Buying Products That Profit Questionable Individuals or Entities

[Augustus]

First, available evidence shows that only a small minority of trans children "desist" or "grow out of gender dysphoria." The "60-90%" claim is overwhelmingly false and unevidenced, at least if we go by current science and not fringe voices:

Transgender kids tend to maintain their identities as they grow up, study suggests

How many transgender kids grow up to stay trans?

The Controversial Research on 'Desistance' in Transgender Youth | KQED

I think this has to do with ambiguous expression.

Her claim was that 60-90% of those who experience gender dysphoria grow out of it, not that 60+% of trans kids grow out of it.

My interpretation was that she means people who question their gender identity as this seems to be the only context such a stat could make sense.

I've no idea about the stats, but they seem quite probable in this context.

Second, there's no evidence that "increasing numbers" of trans women are detransitioning. The wording itself is misleading: since transitioning is now more accessible and more socially accepted than before, any given percentage of detransitioning is going to result in larger numbers now that more people are able to transition. But the percentage itself hasn't been established to be large or to have increased in the first place: 2% (just a random number I'm using as an example) of 1,000 is 20, but 2% of a million is 20,000. The same percentage amounts to a wildly different number.

This is a recent scientific paper, to me if JK Rowlings views on detransitioning are 'transphobic' then this paper must be too as it pretty much says what she said:

Detransition is a growing phenomenon that implies clinical, psychological, and social issues. Inadequate evaluation and use of medicalization as the only means to improve gender dysphoria may lead to later detransition in some teenagers. Comprehensive care by a multidisciplinary and experienced team is essential. As there are no studies reporting the factors predictive of detransition, caution is recommended in cases of atypical identity courses...

In this regard, there is concern that more and more people believe hormone therapy to be the solution to their problems, not only those referring to self-identity, but also those referring to personal frustrations inherent to this phase of life. Some of these individuals visit the endocrinology outpatient clinic without prior psychological assessment or counselling, demanding urgent and hurried medical and surgical treatment....

The true prevalence of the phenomenon is not known but is possibly underestimated. A number of factors have been associated with detransition, though none have been validated to date.

Transsexuality: Transitions, detransitions, and regrets in Spain - ScienceDirect

Any valid concerns she could have expressed have been drowned out by her support for unambiguously anti-trans people (such as Matt Walsh),

In a conversation on twitter (which contained some disagreement), she said his film (which I've not seen) did a good job of highlighting some issues with certain ideological gender theory.

I don't think our society is in very healthy shape if such an interaction counts as 'support' for all a person's views and constitutes a significant moral failing.

hasty conclusions (e.g., the idea that men will intentionally identify as women to assault women in bathrooms),

This is a point about male sex offenders, not transwomen though, and we know humans will take advantage of systems for their own benefit.

It's not going to be a deluge, but it's bound to happen sooner or later. As such it is fair to note and for people to have concerns over.

There are many ways to talk about these issues and discuss them productively, and I do think that some people are too quick to react negatively to even the suggestion that, say, trans women shouldn't automatically be allowed to compete against cis women in sports. But J. K. Rowling seems to me a clear example of someone whose input on the issue has been unproductive and harmful far more often than not.

People have opinions on issues they care about, and high profile people get heard.

The chap who was 'debunking' her in the article wasn't a scientist and was offering his opinions (many of which don't seem to accurately reflect what she said), why are his opinions more productive?

 

[Debater Slayer]

I think there is a clear answer, more or less, on how to define 'man' and 'woman', but a lot of people just don't like it. It is the social understanding of the term that gives it a definition.

And more importantly, to think that such definitions could be authoritatively given by medical and scientific communities doesn't only border scientism... It is scientism.

It's not simply that a lot of people don't like it; it's also that the term has no rigorous or universal definition. You said yourself that the social understanding of the term grants it a definition. In that case, why can't the social understanding change in order to include trans women or trans men in the definition if it hasn't already?

As for why I think that such definitions can be determined by the scientific and medical fields, there are two primary reasons for this:

1) The claim that sex and gender are synonymous is testable and able to be researched in psychology and medicine. It's not a matter of subjective opinion; it's comfortably within the realm of science due to the fact that it can be studied and falsified or confirmed.

2) Human psychology is an entire discipline within medicine. Again, when people make the claim that people born as one sex often exhibit specific traits, this is both measurable and able to be studied. It then becomes a scientific question rather than a merely subjective issue.

 

[Secret Chief]

Sure. But doing what is moral isn't always easy, right? It might mean, for example, you might never again eat many foods you like.

If you have a major moral disagreement with everyone then buy from the ones you disagree the least with... or the ones where your purchase will make the least impact.

Yes, this is the sort of shades of grey I have to weigh up.

 

[Wildswanderer]

There has been some controversy around the upcoming Hogwarts Legacy video game primarily due to the association with Harry Potter and J. K. Rowling, with some calling for a boycott of the game in order to avoid indirectly contributing to J. K. Rowling's activism against trans people.

What are your thoughts on buying media or any other product that profits people who engage in harmful or hateful activism or who otherwise direct money toward causes you find unethical? Do you believe not boycotting the product makes one complicit, even if indirectly, or can one buy something that generates profit for an objectionable individual or entity without necessarily being blameworthy?

This also applies to buying products financing, say, the CCP, supporters of Putin, or any other entity or individual(s) that you may find unethical or hateful.

There's some things I would take a stand on, but in general, I would have to end up boycotting an awful lot of things if I had that mindset.

 

[Debater Slayer]

I think this has to do with ambiguous expression.

Her claim was that 60-90% of those who experience gender dysphoria grow out of it, not that 60+% of trans kids grow out of it.

My interpretation was that she means people who question their gender identity as this seems to be the only context such a stat could make sense.

I've no idea about the stats, but they seem quite probable in this context.

Well, even if we take her statement to be about gender dysphoria only (and the ambiguous wording is still a problem), she didn't provide any evidence for that claim. In my opinion, any responsible public figure who knows they have as much influence as she does should at least try to verify their claims before publishing such an essay knowing that it is bound to affect public opinion to one extent or another, especially when the essay talks about a group who already deal with significant social and legal challenges in many countries.

This is a recent scientific paper, to me if JK Rowlings views on detransitioning are 'transphobic' then this paper must be too as it pretty much says what she said:

Detransition is a growing phenomenon that implies clinical, psychological, and social issues. Inadequate evaluation and use of medicalization as the only means to improve gender dysphoria may lead to later detransition in some teenagers. Comprehensive care by a multidisciplinary and experienced team is essential. As there are no studies reporting the factors predictive of detransition, caution is recommended in cases of atypical identity courses...

In this regard, there is concern that more and more people believe hormone therapy to be the solution to their problems, not only those referring to self-identity, but also those referring to personal frustrations inherent to this phase of life. Some of these individuals visit the endocrinology outpatient clinic without prior psychological assessment or counselling, demanding urgent and hurried medical and surgical treatment....

The true prevalence of the phenomenon is not known but is possibly underestimated. A number of factors have been associated with detransition, though none have been validated to date.

Transsexuality: Transitions, detransitions, and regrets in Spain - ScienceDirect

The article proceeds with much more caution than J. K. Rowling did, though. "Possibly underestimated" is a far cry from her hyperbolic claims of an "explosion" in transitions or unqualified assertion that growing numbers of people are detransitioning. Her wording can understandably give the impression that droves of trans people are now detransitioning and regretting undergoing surgery or hormone therapy, even though she didn't provide any solid evidence whatsoever to back up such a claim.

In a conversation on twitter (which contained some disagreement), she said his film (which I've not seen) did a good job of highlighting some issues with certain ideological gender theory.

I don't think our society is in very healthy shape if such an interaction counts as 'support' for all a person's views and constitutes a significant moral failing.

That's the thing: Matt Walsh didn't really "highlight some issues with certain ideological gender theory"; he's a vocal opponent of LGBT rights based on his conservative Catholic beliefs and far-right political ideology. Among people who are being ideological about the medical aspects of trans issues, people like him are at the forefront.

For a high-profile author like her to casually voice support for him, knowing that this could lend credence to his views among a lot of her audience, strikes me as irresponsible at best. She doesn't have to endorse all of his views; just his views on trans and LGBT issues in general are harmful enough on their own.

This is a point about male sex offenders, not transwomen though, and we know humans will take advantage of systems for their own benefit.

It's not going to be a deluge, but it's bound to happen sooner or later. As such it is fair to note and for people to have concerns over.

Concerns over the possibility are definitely fair, but the way she talked about it seemed to me a lot more definitive than talk of a mere possibility. She made it sound like it was a disaster in the making, if not one that was already underway.

People have opinions on issues they care about, and high profile people get heard.

The chap who was 'debunking' her in the article wasn't a scientist and was offering his opinions (many of which don't seem to accurately reflect what she said), why are his opinions more productive?

In my opinion, high-profile people should be especially mindful of their public speech precisely because they get heard more than the average person. Posting a series of unsubstantiated claims about a group who already deal with a lot of misconceptions and stereotypes doesn't come close to being sufficiently mindful of her influence, unless she simply didn't care or wanted to propagate said claims despite lack of solid evidence.

As for the Forbes article, I found a few of the responses citing counterarguments to be relevant; I wasn't posting it as a debunking of her points, since I haven't yet cross-checked the article's responses against other sources.

 

[SomeRandom]

I'd call them people with Swyer syndrome.

The existence of a few mules does not mean that the terms "donkey" and "horse" can't be legitimately used.

Fair enough

 

[Koldo]

It's not simply that a lot of people don't like it; it's also that the term has no rigorous or universal definition. You said yourself that the social understanding of the term grants it a definition. In that case, why can't the social understanding change in order to include trans women or trans men in the definition if it hasn't already?

It can and it might. It just hasn't happened.

As for why I think that such definitions can be determined by the scientific and medical fields, there are two primary reasons for this:

1) The claim that sex and gender are synonymous is testable and able to be researched in psychology and medicine. It's not a matter of subjective opinion; it's comfortably within the realm of science due to the fact that it can be studied and falsified or confirmed.

2) Human psychology is an entire discipline within medicine. Again, when people make the claim that people born as one sex often exhibit specific traits, this is both measurable and able to be studied. It then becomes a scientific question rather than a merely subjective issue.

Why are you talking about gender?
How does any of this have anything to do with how people in general use the term 'man' and 'woman'?

 

[Debater Slayer]

Why are you talking about gender?
How does any of this have anything to do with how people in general use the term 'man' and 'woman'?

I'm talking about gender because I understand the terms "man" and "woman" to be about gender, whereas "male" and "female" are exclusively about biology. As such, defining the first two necessitates defining what constitutes each gender as well.

 

[Koldo]

I'm talking about gender because I understand the terms "man" and "woman" to be about gender, whereas "male" and "female" are exclusively about biology. As such, defining the first two necessitates defining what constitutes each gender as well.

I see. Doesn't this lead to the conclusion that scientific conclusions concerning whether someone is of a given gender would, on this topic, only be relevant to those with a word usage similar to yours?

 

[SomeRandom]

Well, even if we take her statement to be about gender dysphoria only (and the ambiguous wording is still a problem), she didn't provide any evidence for that claim. In my opinion, any responsible public figure who knows they have as much influence as she does should at least try to verify their claims before publishing such an essay knowing that it is bound to affect public opinion to one extent or another, especially when the essay talks about a group who already deal with significant social and legal challenges in many countries.



The article proceeds with much more caution than J. K. Rowling did, though. "Possibly underestimated" is a far cry from her hyperbolic claims of an "explosion" in transitions or unqualified assertion that growing numbers of people are detransitioning. Her wording can understandably give the impression that droves of trans people are now detransitioning and regretting undergoing surgery or hormone therapy, even though she didn't provide any solid evidence whatsoever to back up such a claim.



That's the thing: Matt Walsh didn't really "highlight some issues with certain ideological gender theory"; he's a vocal opponent of LGBT rights based on his conservative Catholic beliefs and far-right political ideology. Among people who are being ideological about the medical aspects of trans issues, people like him are at the forefront.

For a high-profile author like her to casually voice support for him, knowing that this could lend credence to his views among a lot of her audience, strikes me as irresponsible at best. She doesn't have to endorse all of his views; just his views on trans and LGBT issues in general are harmful enough on their own.



Concerns over the possibility are definitely fair, but the way she talked about it seemed to me a lot more definitive than talk of a mere possibility. She made it sound like it was a disaster in the making, if not one that was already underway.



In my opinion, high-profile people should be especially mindful of their public speech precisely because they get heard more than the average person. Posting a series of unsubstantiated claims about a group who already deal with a lot of misconceptions and stereotypes doesn't come close to being sufficiently mindful of her influence, unless she simply didn't care or wanted to propagate said claims despite lack of solid evidence.

As for the Forbes article, I found a few of the responses citing counterarguments to be relevant; I wasn't posting it as a debunking of her points, since I haven't yet cross-checked the article's responses against other sources.

Uhhh I didn’t know she supported Matt Walsh.
I admit to only knowing of him through leftists responding to him.
But I have heard that he considers 16 year olds to be “at their most fertile” and laments them not marrying.
And he has the gall to call the alphabet soup community groomers.
What a creep

 

[Debater Slayer]

I see. Doesn't this lead to the conclusion that scientific conclusions concerning whether someone is of a given gender would, on this topic, only be relevant to those with a word usage similar to yours?

Scientific contexts employ the terms in a specific and rigorous fashion, so of course using the terms in a different manner changes the context. It's similar to how "theory" means something in science and something else in common parlance.

 

[Koldo]

Scientific contexts employ the terms in a specific and rigorous fashion, so of course using the terms in a different manner changes the context. It's similar to how "theory" means something in science and something else in common parlance.

I don't see anything rigorous about using gender as the defining factor in the sciences to determine who is a man and who is a woman, but rather agenda-driven.

 

[Debater Slayer]

I don't see anything rigorous about using gender as the defining factor in the sciences to determine who is a man and who is a woman, but rather agenda-driven.

What's the alternative? To define the terms solely using sex? That would fail to take into account the existence of non-binary and trans people, and it would be both overgeneralized and lacking in nuance.

Language has always evolved in accordance with social, scientific, and cultural changes. I don't see this subject as any different. If anything, the push to deny current science on gender more often than not seems to come from an ideologically charged and agenda-driven position.

 

[Koldo]

What's the alternative? To define the terms solely using sex? That would fail to take into account the existence of non-binary and trans people, and it would be both overgeneralized and lacking in nuance.

Language has always evolved in accordance with social, scientific, and cultural changes. I don't see this subject as any different. If anything, the push to deny current science on gender more often than not seems to come from an ideologically charged and agenda-driven position.

Why would non-binary and trans people have to necessarily be either 'man' or 'woman'?

 

[RestlessSoul]

I never knowingly patronise Amazon, Uber, Starbucks, News International, Facebook (though I do use WhatsApp) or Twitter. This is not because their CEOs have controversial opinions, it’s because I consider each of them to operate in a manner which is ethically indefensible.

We don’t have much individual power as consumers in a world drowning under the weight of tomorrow’s garbage, but collectively we do. The world wide boycott of South African exports in the 1980s and 90s, was a significant factor in isolating the apartheid regime.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

There has been some controversy around the upcoming Hogwarts Legacy video game primarily due to the association with Harry Potter and J. K. Rowling, with some calling for a boycott of the game in order to avoid indirectly contributing to J. K. Rowling's activism against trans people.

What are your thoughts on buying media or any other product that profits people who engage in harmful or hateful activism or who otherwise direct money toward causes you find unethical? Do you believe not boycotting the product makes one complicit, even if indirectly, or can one buy something that generates profit for an objectionable individual or entity without necessarily being blameworthy?

This also applies to buying products financing, say, the CCP, supporters of Putin, or any other entity or individual(s) that you may find unethical or hateful.

I buy petrol. At some point it gets hard to avoid or even completely know who my money is supporting.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Boycotts are "cancel culture"? As far as I know, no one is calling for her to be legally penalized for her opinions. Voting with one's wallet is an age-old and valid method of expression, as is encouraging people to avoid giving their money to certain individuals or entities. Do you oppose these personal freedoms?

Oppose as in call them out as distasteful? It would seem no more opinionative or restrictive than a boycott on product. Indeed less so.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

I have refused to buy a Coors product for decades, because the Coors family funded anti-LGBTQ efforts. I will never buy anything from Coors, as a result.

I also boycott Coors, due to the rubbish products they produce.
However I am now doubly glad I do so.

 

[Debater Slayer]

Oppose as in call them out as distasteful? It would seem no more opinionative or restrictive than a boycott on product. Indeed less so.

No, oppose as in vilify those who employ such a tactic by implying they're "canceling" someone even though they're merely making a decision concerning their own money.

I think some of J. K. Rowling's public takes have been much more distasteful than a boycott could possibly be. At least boycotting her doesn't spread misconceptions that have been used to restrict an entire group's legal rights.

 

[Debater Slayer]

I buy petrol. At some point it gets hard to avoid or even completely know who my money is supporting.

I find this to also be the case with products that involve multiple parts from different sources, such as phones and cars. If an entire car is made by an "ethically conscious" corporation (if such a thing even exists) but just the battery uses minerals sourced from slave mines in Africa, should we boycott the company? And who do we buy from if all other automotive companies employ similar practices?

It's such a complicated issue, and I particularly find it concerning when someone becomes ethically complacent or confident in their perceived righteousness because they boycott just one problematic entity while supporting many others (whether knowingly or not). Acknowledging the complexity of this topic seems to me a key step toward discussing it meaningfully.