Hogwarts Legacy - Not as good as Dog Kid University

[TehStu]

32 minutes ago, kensei said:

no one would ever do this?

 

About 0.6% of the US is transgender. We have 12 states enacting anti-trans laws for high school/college sport. Utah upheld a law which prevents 4 out of 75,000 high school athletes competing, as those 4 are trans omen.

 

Think of the sheer volume of opportunity for for men be horrific to women, with consummate ease, getting away with it for as long as you like.

 

Consider your scenario.

 

Does you post genuinely represent your position?

 

edit - don't bother. You're going on ignore, I've got zero tolerance for this shit.

[kensei]

10 minutes ago, Mr. Gerbik said:

Let me be clear so people in the back can also understand. Suggesting that there *might be a chance* that people go through life altering and traumatic treatments just to be a perv is akin to suggesting that burglars *might* be investing millions of dollars into construction projects and subsequently selling those houses to rich people just to be able burglar them.

 

You see how STUPID that sounds? I'm fucking go afk, I have to get away from this for a bit

 

 

So the preferred approach by the trans community is self id - switching gender without any medical requirements. Statutory declaration is enough.

 

This is 100% open to abuse and shouting at me won't change it. It is also a potentially toxic political issue. Shouting at me won't change that either.

 

I also personally don't think there are many limits on what potential abusers would do in order to abuse having lived through all of the above. Systems need set up to assume it because the alternative has not served us well.

[Graham S]

Of course I think you should be able to use the right toilet before you’ve legally transitioned or had particular kinds of surgery. That’s how this works. The doctors are expecting you to have socially transitioned and  lived in your gender for a long time before they’d prescribe hormones for instance. 
 

I’m not sure what the right legal and medical process should be. I imagine it’s different for different people. I can say the current process is clearly broken and is failing a lot of people right now. 
 

Again, these imaginary bogeymen doing things casually or for nefarious reasons are either entirely fictional or incredibly rare. Set against that there are a lot of distressed people being failed by the NHS and under continual attack from a lot of people who are behaving disgracefully. 

[kensei]

13 minutes ago, TehStu said:

 

About 0.6% of the US is transgender. We have 12 states enacting anti-trans laws for high school/college sport. Utah upheld a law which prevents 4 out of 75,000 high school athletes competing, as those 4 are trans omen.

 

Think of the sheer volume of opportunity for for men be horrific to women, with consummate ease, getting away with it for as long as you like.

 

Consider your scenario.

 

Does you post genuinely represent your position?

 

The statistics on how many people are trans aren't actually relevant; the relevant statistic is how many bad people would choose to try and take advantage of liberal laws around changing id. I have no idea what that figure is but agree it would be small. However that small number could still cause damage and laws should consider it.

 

But that wasn't really my point. My point was if you've moved to actually mocking women's concerns over this, you've completely lost your head in all senses.

[Graham S]

I’m afraid that rights are seldom won by waiting for nice middle class people to give you them. This change was always going to be upsetting for some people, but that doesn’t make them right. I do agree the poisonous atmosphere around trans issues in this country is destructive. 

[kensei]

9 minutes ago, Graham S said:

I’m afraid that rights are seldom won by waiting for nice middle class people to give you them. This change was always going to be upsetting for some people, but that doesn’t make them right. I do agree the poisonous atmosphere around trans issues in this country is destructive. 

 

I am afraid are seldom won by driving all the nice middle class women to vote for the Tory Party either. 

[Mr. Gerbik]

Not allowing for trans rights because there might be "bad apples". That's lovely, you could use that same argument against giving rights to any minority group in theory. Oh wait, that argument was actually historically made by those who would deny certain groups their human rights. I don't know if you don't realize how you sound or whether you just don't care.

 

 

[Graham S]

9 minutes ago, kensei said:

 

I am afraid are seldom won by driving all the nice middle class women to vote for the Tory Party either. 

I’m not a political strategist. But I can speak up for real people who need our support. Gay marriage was won by having these conversations, and bigots came to realise that gay people deserve the same things as the rest of us. I think if we can move the conversation on from mendacious scare stories and back to reality that would be for the best. We might not be able to fix JK Rowling’s cronies but on here we’re better than that. 

[bradigor]

Fuck you kensei. What you have written is disgusting. 

 

What you are choosing to use is a scenario that is 'possible' in the same way it is 'possible' the future depicted in Terminator is 'possible' just because you can think it doesn't make it true. 

 

The are always outliers but that should never be enough to ruin the lives of 99.99999999% of people who are trans. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[nakamura]

The game looks shit btw. 

[The Grand Pursuivant]

1 hour ago, kensei said:

 

So you've lived through metoo, endless revelations of celebrities in the 70s being sex pests, paedophilia scandals in the Catholic Church and others in positions of trust and you conclusion is no one would ever do this?

 

Any change in the law needs to very carefully consider the potential for bad actors. The UK public is okay with people changing gender (though by no means universal). However, they are generally against self id without medical assessment and a period where you've being living in your chosen gender.

 

If you want to pick and lose a culture war and damage the rights of the people you claim to care about, trivialising or mocking women raising this issue is the A1 100% route to it.

 

Associating trans people and their struggle for equality with paedophilia is transphobic and these kinds of comments are completely unwelcome on this forum.

 

I have given kensei a 24 hour ban for this and his other posts in the thread and will consult with the other mods if it should be extended.

[BossSaru]

40 minutes ago, kensei said:

The statistics on how many people are trans aren't actually relevant; the relevant statistic is how many bad people would choose to try and take advantage of liberal laws around changing id. I have no idea what that figure is but agree it would be small. However that small number could still cause damage and laws should consider it.

 

Of course the statistics are relevant. This is, given the lack of cases of its occurrence, a non-issue created by bigots to encourage fears of a victimised minority. We can not create policy purely on 'what if' arguments if we want to have a free society.

 

It is much like voter fraud being used to justify voter ID. Something that you agree has led to a disproportionate response to the actual issue.  An issue in which the Tories have created a fear amongst the public, and then created a solution that does not fix anything, but instead helps to further their own goals.

[George Clooney]

I was going to write out a longer response but see he's been banned, so thought it best to leave till he can at least respond, or hopefully has had time to think about the idea that somehow there are people who want to assault women but are just waiting till they can go "nah mate, i identify as a women now, honest" to attack them in a toilet isnt a fucking stupid idea.

 

[Spacehost]

1 hour ago, kensei said:

I also personally don't think there are many limits on what potential abusers would do in order to abuse having lived through all of the above. Systems need set up to assume it because the alternative has not served us well.

This is a spectacularly dense non-argument that has been used against pretty much every minority group for pretty much every possible attempt to reach some sort of equity. Using victims of sex crimes as a stick to beat the transgender community with helps no one, and is not going to stop a single sexual assault. It isn't going to make women any safer or sexual predators any less dangerous.

[Delargey]

Considering men who want to assault women, already do so in our streets, or in clubs or on public transport, or in workplaces, or via social media - I don't see why they would particularly go to the extra effort to do so in the toilets. 

 

It's strange that all this concert about "bad faith" abusers sneaking in toilets never translates into vocal campaigns for tougher sentences for sexual assaults etc.

[Delargey]

1 hour ago, kensei said:

 

I also personally don't think there are many limits on what potential abusers would do in order to abuse having lived through all of the above. Systems need set up to assume it because the alternative has not served us well.

 

By this logic systems need to be set up to assume that cis males (the biggest perpetrators) will abuse women in pretty much every walk of life. What system do you propose for say the night bus? Assuming that a percentage cis males will assault women there?

[Azrael]

1 hour ago, Graham S said:

We’re just saying here you should be able to use the toilet that you think is most appropriate to you, without abuse or hassle. Just normal people, needing the loo.

 

If only we could all just shit our pants and magic the poop away. Would end this whole transphobia issue in an instant 

[Captain Kelsten]

Just now, Azrael said:

 

If only we could all just shit our pants and magic the poop away. Would end this whole transphobia issue in an instant 

Holy shit. You’re right. It was an allegory for transphobia this whole time 😱

[Spacehost]

21 minutes ago, Delargey said:

 

By this logic systems need to be set up to assume that cis males (the biggest perpetrators) will abuse women in pretty much every walk of life. What system do you propose for say the night bus? Assuming that a percentage cis males will assault women there?

It’s the sort of argument that’s meant to make me uncomfortable with going around with my daughter without my other half present; the presumption that if I’m taking her to the bathroom or whatever it’s to assault her.

[Delargey]

Kensei argument is essentially the same as Batman's reason for attacking Superman "If there is a 1% chance, you have to take it as an absolute certainty" accept the "chance" is far lower than 1%.

[fragglerock]

https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7nmzk/hogwarts-legacy-imagines-a-harry-potter-without-jk-rowling

 

Quote

Harry Potter is as much part of the fabric of popular culture as superheroes or Disney films. Yet, as a person that grew up at the height of the books’ popularity, I cannot think of anything I want less than more Harry Potter. It’s true there is a massive passive audience for the Potter series, and that even after the final book was published in 2007, Rowling’s fictional world became an indelible part of popular culture. The Cursed Child, a play set in Rowling’s Potter universe, won multiple Tony awards including Best Play, and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them grossed $814 million worldwide, and was the eighth highest-grossing film of 2016.

 

Hogwarts Legacy will enter a world that has a different tolerance for Rowling’s wizards than either of those previous two properties did, though. Since about 2020, Rowling has become infamous for her outspoken views on trans people. She has gone as far as legally threatening people who speak ill of her on Twitter. Her arguments are typical for transphobes, especially in England: While she proclaims to be protecting women and lesbians, she sidles up to prominent homophobic activists on Twitter.

 

[Nick R]

3 hours ago, The Grand Pursuivant said:

Associating trans people and their struggle for equality with paedophilia is transphobic and these kinds of comments are completely unwelcome on this forum.

 

I have given kensei a 24 hour ban for this and his other posts in the thread and will consult with the other mods if it should be extended.

 

I don't think that the Kensei post you quoted was ban-worthy. Because that post's first paragraph wasn't associating genuine trans people with paedophilia and other sex crimes, it was suggesting that people who want to commit those crimes might falsely claim that they're trans in order to give them cover to do so. The first paragraph gave examples of how far men have gone in the past, in order to support the claim that it's not entirely outside the bounds of possibility.

 

Of course, the people who committed those crimes only had to put on a false public face - they didn't have to change themselves at all, let alone to the extent of the medical transition process that @Mr. Gerbik described his friend going through.

 

To which Kensei argued that a hypothetical abuser wouldn't need to go through that process because self-ID exists, and that the possibility of abusing that law, however unlikely, should be very carefully considered, before we rush into making changes to the law.

 

That's an argument that the subtler TERFs like to make. By which I mean: not the ones who make their opinion on their single-issue obsession obvious by filling their Twitter bios with dogwhistle phrases or blatant insults ("Adult Human Female", "believer in Material Reality", "#WomenWon'tWheesht", "Pronouns: Fuck/You", "deluded men in dresses"). Those people embody the "phobia" part of "transphobia", and so I find it easy to pigeonhole and ignore them.

 

But when the arguments are phrased in the way that Kensei has, I find it harder to make convincing counter-arguments.

[Delargey]

54 minutes ago, Nick R said:

Of course, the people who committed those crimes only had to put on a false public face - they didn't have to change themselves at all, let alone to the extent of the medical transition process that @Mr. Gerbik described his friend going through.

 

To which Kensei argued that a hypothetical abuser wouldn't need to go through that process because self-ID exists, and that the possibility of abusing that law, however unlikely, should be very carefully considered, before we rush into making changes to the law.

 

I don't understand what benefit self-ID gives the hypothetical abuser in this toilet scenario though?

 

As soon as they do anything inappropriate they would be in the same situation than if they just walked into the toilet now.

 

There are lots of situations that make it easier for men to abuse women, yet there isn't a rush of people trying to curtail the freedoms of cis men to protect from the possibility of future crimes?

[footle]

1 hour ago, Delargey said:

 

I don't understand what benefit self-ID gives the hypothetical abuser in this toilet scenario though?

 

As soon as they do anything inappropriate they would be in the same situation than if they just walked into the toilet now.

 

 

It’s weird as an argument isn’t it?

[ChewMagma]

9 hours ago, Nick R said:

 

I don't think that the Kensei post you quoted was ban-worthy. Because that post's first paragraph wasn't associating genuine trans people with paedophilia and other sex crimes, it was suggesting that people who want to commit those crimes might falsely claim that they're trans in order to give them cover to do so. The first paragraph gave examples of how far men have gone in the past, in order to support the claim that it's not entirely outside the bounds of possibility.

 

Of course, the people who committed those crimes only had to put on a false public face - they didn't have to change themselves at all, let alone to the extent of the medical transition process that @Mr. Gerbik described his friend going through.

 

To which Kensei argued that a hypothetical abuser wouldn't need to go through that process because self-ID exists, and that the possibility of abusing that law, however unlikely, should be very carefully considered, before we rush into making changes to the law.

 

That's an argument that the subtler TERFs like to make. By which I mean: not the ones who make their opinion on their single-issue obsession obvious by filling their Twitter bios with dogwhistle phrases or blatant insults ("Adult Human Female", "believer in Material Reality", "#WomenWon'tWheesht", "Pronouns: Fuck/You", "deluded men in dresses"). Those people embody the "phobia" part of "transphobia", and so I find it easy to pigeonhole and ignore them.

 

But when the arguments are phrased in the way that Kensei has, I find it harder to make convincing counter-arguments.

 

You need to stop thinking about this in terms of arguments and counter-arguments that need to be won by people on the internet or with hypothetical Tory voters, which is what people like kensei want the whole thing to get bogged down in, and instead think very much more clearly about the people who actually have to live these realities every day. Why should they be made to live in perpetual misery because some people are afraid of them? How is that different to the way in which any other minority has been treated and persecuted and feared throughout history? I don't think it is.

[footle]

10 hours ago, Nick R said:

I don't think that the Kensei post you quoted was ban-worthy.

You need to separate individual posts from bad faith posts, and arguments about ridiculous and unnecessary hypotheticals from reality.

The individual post is shit, but the doubling down after is the bit you ban for.

 

Abusers don’t need “cover” to abuse someone. Just because some movie producers are Harvey Weinstein doesn’t mean all movie producers are Harvey Weinstein. Just because some MPs are Elphick doesn’t mean Corbyn sexually assaults his staff. But it’s worse than that,  because in this case the hypothetical abuser is just that - someone who lives in the minds of a certain category of people and who is used to demonise a much larger group.

[chamberlago]

Toilets and most gendered spaces have basically worked on a self-id basis forever. I've certainly never been asked to produce my birth certificate to prove I'm a man before entering the gents.

 

The idea making it easier for trans people to make it simpler to update their birth certificate with their true gender will suddenly unleash some horror on society is absurd. From what I remember the Gender Recognition Act reforms that kicked this whole panic off will still require a legal commitment to live as their updated gender and it would be considered an offence to do it under false pretences. This whole panic is ridiculous because unless you are trans you would basically not be affected in any way and you'd notice zero change.

 

There are already countries that have implemented self id and there is no evidence as far as I'm aware of there being negative consequences.

[Unofficial Who]

I've been thinking about this exchange for most of the day but have held off posting thinking that others would post better responses to kensei's posts (and they have.)

 

The few things I have to contribute

 

-Some of this conversation might be better held in off topic. Although to be frank trans and nb users of the forum could probably do without having to read this stuff as most of it has been debated time and time again.

 

-I can see why some might find the ban harsh given that kensei is talking not of his own views but about the views of others. He might be acting in good faith but I suspect years of people posting in bad faith in the tropes thread has worn on many people's patience. And using "some people may say" or "some people may think" leads to circular arguments as everyone then argues about the political views of people who aren't posting here.

 

-Some offenders are going to use self id in bad faith. The solution shouldn't be to tell all trans people "sorry, but because some are going to act in bad faith we will have to deny you the right to exist." It's an argument that has been used against equal rights for women, equal rights in regards to race or class and even more recently an argument that was used against same sex marriage.

 

-It's also a rubbish solution in that we have a system where people who do transgress the law and try to use bad faith arguments can have those tested in a court of law by a judge and by their peers.

 

-And just a reminder with this line that we have trans members (who are unlikely to self ID here as such, I wonder why?). I've seen first hand the pain caused when the comparison is made between sex offenders and trans people (in much the same way a few years ago that gay men were labelled as potential sex offenders for wanting same sex marriage.) The distress is compounded when said person is someone who has survived such an assault.

 

I mean it's such a gross idea isn't it. Telling the people that are the most likely to suffer violent assault that they need to not transition because people will think they might be sexual predators. Doubly so when the clear majority of sexual predators are men. I guess to bring it back to popular culture JK Rowling has enormous clout here. She may have lost a slew of fans but many more will read her tweets and read her Galbraith books and it will effect how trans women are perceived in much the same way that Silence of the Lambs, South Park and many others have created negative perceptions of trans women.

 

 

 

 

[Harsin]

TERF seems to be the final evolution for nearly every sensible if you feed them enough Guardian articles and Mumsnet posts at the local Pokémon Centre.

[Eighthours]

Having read a lot written by both sides on the toilets issue, I don't think that the 'access could be abused!' argument is as simple as women being bigoted and not wanting trans women to be in their bathrooms. For some, sure it is that... but not for the majority of those who object, in my opinion.

 

Many women don't want people they consider to be men having access to their toilets. Full stop. But that's not (in most cases, I'd say) about trans women who have transitioned - it's the thought that self ID is a worrying red line that could lead to unintended consequences. If someone has been through years of treatment, doctor's appointments and surgery to transition, then I'd wager there is much more acceptance from so-called TERFs of their presence in the type of bathroom intended for their gender identity. As Mr Gerbik said about his friend, women transitioning have to go through so much to reach that point! I wish that we had some figures for this differentiation of views, as it tends to all be put in the same pot when people are arguing about it. I think that we'd find the in favour / not in favour mix to be much more nuanced when putting forward views on self ID vs fully transitioned/in transition, in contrast to the rather binary debates on the toilets issue where everyone is just screaming at each other.

 

The prospect of a light bulb 'I'm a woman now' moment is considered worrying by women who don't want what they consider private, intimate bathroom activities potentially shared by someone who could have literally been a man 5 minutes previously. The prospect of changing gender identity on a whim - or rather, pretending to - is ripe for abuse as (I know you all know this, I'm just writing it down) it means that anyone can go into a woman's toilet, including men who have no intention of actually transitioning or presenting as a woman but can simply respond with 'I consider myself to be a woman so I'm allowed here, try to stop me'. I consider this scenario MUCH more likely than people who are actually presenting as women ever causing a problem, or them ever going into a bathroom with bad motives. So what we have here is a fear that a law/guidance being adjusted could make predatory behaviour from men easier.

 

I get the point that any man can go into a women's bathroom now and assault someone, but crucially there is legal recourse for that. This, for me, is the absolute key to all this. The fear is that if the law changes there will then be no legal recourse to women for a man walking in and experiencing their private moments in a bathroom, no way to challenge them - this will empower such men as there will be no consequences. They would literally have to assault someone to be in trouble. They could watch, experience, stay... and throughout, they would have the law on their side. That's what many women fear. And this is considered by them to be a violation of their rights. The prospect is emasculating for them.

 

For me, the prospect of trans women ever abusing someone in a bathroom or being there for the wrong reasons is just a perceived fear rather than any kind of reality beyond a tiny, tiny number of edge cases. For women who don't want self-ID to happen, though it's about such a change's potential to enable bad behaviour that wouldn't have been possible previously without recourse in the law. Trans people are unfortunately taking the brunt of this fear because the changes we're experiencing in society in fast-forward are taking place, as far as some women are concerned, 'because' of trans rights being extended. That's also crucial. What we're seeing playing out is a backlash from some women against the group seen as responsible - to them - for unintended, awful consequences of a change in the law. After all, if trans women didn't (rightly) want access to women's bathrooms, there would be no lobbying for this change.

 

I'm not a woman, so I don't feel that I have a right to tread on their lived experiences and dismiss their fears, even if I don't think that their objections ultimately have much to do with trans women beyond their presence as the catalyst for changes to the law. However, I think that is also recognised by a lot of the women who object. I can also see why it sticks in the craw that there will be male bathrooms and gender neutral bathrooms - check out who's losing what they might see as their 'own' there. But of course, trans women will have their own set of lived experiences that should be taken into account too, and these should definitely include being comfortable and welcome going to the toilet in a women's bathroom.

 

Tl;dr: bad men ruin everything as usual.

 

(As usual with this charged issue, I hope I haven't offended anyone here with what I've written - I'm very happy to change anything that you consider doesn't make clear my respect for trans women and their rights.)