This is bang on. We don't talk enough about this massive contradiction. I've always struggled to understand how people who call themselves "leftists" are so comfortable with extreme individualism in tramsactivism. The concept of solidarity is fundamental to left wing politics, if everything is all about individual self actualisation and limitless freedom then how can it be called left wing? It's more like libertarianism (but with a bit of good old left wing authoritarianism thrown in when it comes to enforcement!). This contradiction is visible in other areas of leftist politics beyond the trans issue, especially mainstream liberal feminism (not radical feminism, which does know what solidarity is).
I feel like I’m going around blackpilling people on this report which isn’t my intention. But in general, we’ve learned that systems with inherent contradictions can sustain themselves and remain powerful for a surprisingly long time.
Modern medicine, in many ways, is a giant machine of push-back against nature’s limits and natural laws. In its most honest and virtuous forms, this means life-preserving and life-bettering procedures and practices for people with true need. The slippery slope that is coated in greed, innovation-lust, and Frankenstein-level morbid curiosity very much exists however. When patients with extreme desires meet with the practitioners and institutions who are sliding down that slippery slope like it’s the opening day at the water park we must have some sort of ethical reckoning with what we are witnessing and allowing.
That said, there are countless desires that medicine pushes back against-we don’t simply allow patients with suicidal or homicidal ideation (except in Canada I suppose, in the case of suicide) to get on with it. We don’t give ETOH withdrawal patients booze. We don’t affirm the schizophrenic with a God complex. We don’t tell pregnant women that they can be electively induced at 35 weeks just because they are “done” being pregnant. What makes the gender-confusion flavor of irrational desire so special? It’s the politicization and the social pressure paired with the doctors and researchers that are more prone to tempting the slippery surfaces.
The shame lies in how far these people have been allowed to slip. If public reigning-in based on majority opinion is what stops the landslide then it is a worthwhile endeavor. The limits of liberty begin and end with natural law, so the bio-libertarians are more like bio-bypassers, and this paired with extreme leftist ideology that insists on the bankrolling of that bypassing creates a chaotic mess.
Spot on. As usual you have produced a clear argument from the vague half-formed thoughts milling around my brain, and which I am generally a loss to explain to my – male – partner, a self-described ‘left-wing libertarian’. Maybe I’ll try again.
Regarding triage: Trans activists have found a way to "jump the line:" threatening suicide. After all, if their condition is fatal, why wouldn't they be prioritized ahead of broken arms or pneumonia?
I think I'm in agreement with all this, but I do have a follow-up question.
Despite gender-affirmative care not always being the best solution, it's clear that there is a real problem here - gender dysphoria is an agonising condition that you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy, and some treatment is required. These are sick people who need help; the main problem is that what they need is not the same as what they want.
Mental health therapy is another facet of healthcare that has been abandoned by the NHS, and left to incredibly shady companies like BetterHelp. It's fallen into the same trap as transgender medicine, of developing a business model where private companies first try to convince you something is wrong with you and then sell you an expensive cure (Freya India has written well on this).
Would you support mental health provision, including treatment for gender dysphoria, on the NHS?
Hey Mary, I really love your articles but I don’t suppose you would like to create audio recorded versions of them? Some of us prefer to listen to these in your own voice than razz them. Personally I consume your articles when I’m on-the-go since I don’t have much time to actually read
First a typo: "The Cass review represents a ponderous efforts by the vast NHS bureaucracy to self-correct and rein in such excesses." Should be "effort"
I wonder what the potential is for this kind of article to convince idealistic leftists that they are making a mistake. Obviously anyone who doesn't have an emotional or ideological need to believe that a significant minority of kids need new genitals and hormone treatment won't believe that 1% of kids need new genitals and hormone treatment. Most of us are going to look at this and say, "Well, we don't have enough money to put wheels on every fish out there, but we already knew it was crazy, so whatever." But the people you identify as "Left-wing bio-libertarians" don't see the craziness, so maybe a cost-benefit analysis will work?
I see two problems, though. The first problem is that people crazy enough to think our kids need gender reassignment might be so far gone that real-world financial concerns don't seem to be a big deal. They're idealists fighting transphobia; if they run up against economic barriers, they'll just call the economic barriers transphobic. Maybe there are cooler heads around who can be convinced by these arguments to stop financing transition surgeries? I still envision that looking like this:
Beleaguered bureaucrat: "Sorry, we really really would be all in for sex reassignment surgery, you know. Power to the transgendered, and all that. But we just - oof - you know money is so tight right now, and it's--"
Trans activist: "Transphobe!"
The second problem is calling trans activists "left-wing bio-libertarians," which is quite a mouthful and doesn't make sense anyway. I've never met a libertarian who wants to spend other people's money. If you must, call them "gender transhumanists" or "leftist tranhumanists," but if we're going there, frankly the people you're discussing are really idealistic leftists: https://thingstoread.substack.com/i/139095464/the-woke-are-idealistic-not-realistic-and-not-libertarian
I really don't think an argument based on "social solidarity" will work on the postmodern Left and the Andy Chus of the world—aren't they all Rousseau's demented grandchildren who believe that modern society is the root cause of any and all ailments? Don't they all insist that if this thing called Society doesn't reflect back the same beautiful self-flattering reflection they see in the mirror than that means it's ipso facto evll and needs to be destroyed? That because they weren't invited to this party called Norms, then this party needs to be raided by the cops, with maybe the whole building getting burned down too?
"Social solidarity" is exactly what the postmodern Left seeks to destroy, by any means necessary.
This is another illustration of the incoherence of Modernity's dominant Liberal sect. We are all individuals who contract to form society as an instrument for individual ends. We agree to make the sacrifices necessary to sustain this society, even up to the point of risking our own individual death in its defense. We do so because we cannot obtain the individual benefits of the society unless a sufficient proportion of its members agree to the sacrifices and the risk.
What sacrifices are necessary to sustain the society? This is a way of asking, "What is the minimum provision that we must guarantee all individuals to prevent them from abrogating the agreement?" In general, self-interested individuals will be loath to make provisions for things that they themselves don't want, or recognize the general need for. The question of the minimum provision thus becomes the center of politics, with individuals lumping into affinity groups, all trying to shortchange or beggar each other.
That "sufficient proportion of members" willing to sacrifice points to another problem. Why wouldn't a particular individual (or affinity group) try to minimize his own proportion of the sacrifices and risks, and maximize those of others? In the abstract, we can say, "because he realizes that such defections, if universalized, would deprive him of society's benefits." But in practice, this just means that the individual will seek a situation in which he can defect, either without being detected or without being challenged, and others do not or cannot defect. Perhaps he will convince others that their sacrifices "should" be proportionally greater, for some reason. But when it comes down to concrete cases -- the level we actually live on -- specific, effective-immediately decisions about resource allocation, or who has to be the point man for the patrol, must be made. At that point, the individual must make a choice to defect or not to defect. Absent the threat of punishment, why would he choose not to?
So this is a society of free, mutually non-interfering, self-interested individuals, all of whom are rationally trying to shortchange, beggar, or defect on the other signatories to the "social contract." But it isn't like that, you say. People don't act that way.
Why don't they act that way? The answer to that question falsifies our justification for setting up society on this basis in the first place.
What happens if more of them *start* to act that way? We are seeing the results.
So again we see that the left cannot make the trains run on time. Who would have thought that? Nagging hippies are only necessary to remind the ossifying right that there are people in need and that physical power or economic superiority does not equal righteousness. They are in no way suited to hold the reins of power.
The "paradox in postmodern leftism".....Not just 'postmodern', this paradox has been at the heart of leftism - and of the British Labour Party ever since it first managed to form a government in the 1920s. I still remember coming up against this paradox, as a teenager in the 1960s, desperately wanting, teenager-like, for there to be socialist 'Equality' everywhere. My teenage mind tried so hard to square the circle but reality just kept on getting in the way.
What you say makes total sense, and yet it’s not being borne out in Canada. We have a 100 percent publicly funded health care system that is actively promoting wrong sex hormones and mutilating surgeries. Our federal government offers $75,000 in health care coverage to employees who want the surgeries to mimic the opposite sex. A court last week decided that the taxpayer-funded health insurance had to pay for a man to have a “neo vagina” constructed while retaining his penis. It’s insane. So we have to ask whose big pockets are pressuring our politicians and institutions to do this?
So, besides injecting m[iracle]RNA COVIDIUS toxic spew into the bodies of children... Adults are also injecting toxic gender mambo jambo into the Thought/Brain of the children!
This is bang on. We don't talk enough about this massive contradiction. I've always struggled to understand how people who call themselves "leftists" are so comfortable with extreme individualism in tramsactivism. The concept of solidarity is fundamental to left wing politics, if everything is all about individual self actualisation and limitless freedom then how can it be called left wing? It's more like libertarianism (but with a bit of good old left wing authoritarianism thrown in when it comes to enforcement!). This contradiction is visible in other areas of leftist politics beyond the trans issue, especially mainstream liberal feminism (not radical feminism, which does know what solidarity is).
I feel like I’m going around blackpilling people on this report which isn’t my intention. But in general, we’ve learned that systems with inherent contradictions can sustain themselves and remain powerful for a surprisingly long time.
Modern medicine, in many ways, is a giant machine of push-back against nature’s limits and natural laws. In its most honest and virtuous forms, this means life-preserving and life-bettering procedures and practices for people with true need. The slippery slope that is coated in greed, innovation-lust, and Frankenstein-level morbid curiosity very much exists however. When patients with extreme desires meet with the practitioners and institutions who are sliding down that slippery slope like it’s the opening day at the water park we must have some sort of ethical reckoning with what we are witnessing and allowing.
That said, there are countless desires that medicine pushes back against-we don’t simply allow patients with suicidal or homicidal ideation (except in Canada I suppose, in the case of suicide) to get on with it. We don’t give ETOH withdrawal patients booze. We don’t affirm the schizophrenic with a God complex. We don’t tell pregnant women that they can be electively induced at 35 weeks just because they are “done” being pregnant. What makes the gender-confusion flavor of irrational desire so special? It’s the politicization and the social pressure paired with the doctors and researchers that are more prone to tempting the slippery surfaces.
The shame lies in how far these people have been allowed to slip. If public reigning-in based on majority opinion is what stops the landslide then it is a worthwhile endeavor. The limits of liberty begin and end with natural law, so the bio-libertarians are more like bio-bypassers, and this paired with extreme leftist ideology that insists on the bankrolling of that bypassing creates a chaotic mess.
Spot on. As usual you have produced a clear argument from the vague half-formed thoughts milling around my brain, and which I am generally a loss to explain to my – male – partner, a self-described ‘left-wing libertarian’. Maybe I’ll try again.
Regarding triage: Trans activists have found a way to "jump the line:" threatening suicide. After all, if their condition is fatal, why wouldn't they be prioritized ahead of broken arms or pneumonia?
I think I'm in agreement with all this, but I do have a follow-up question.
Despite gender-affirmative care not always being the best solution, it's clear that there is a real problem here - gender dysphoria is an agonising condition that you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy, and some treatment is required. These are sick people who need help; the main problem is that what they need is not the same as what they want.
Mental health therapy is another facet of healthcare that has been abandoned by the NHS, and left to incredibly shady companies like BetterHelp. It's fallen into the same trap as transgender medicine, of developing a business model where private companies first try to convince you something is wrong with you and then sell you an expensive cure (Freya India has written well on this).
Would you support mental health provision, including treatment for gender dysphoria, on the NHS?
"The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money." - Margaret Thatcher
Hey Mary, I really love your articles but I don’t suppose you would like to create audio recorded versions of them? Some of us prefer to listen to these in your own voice than razz them. Personally I consume your articles when I’m on-the-go since I don’t have much time to actually read
First a typo: "The Cass review represents a ponderous efforts by the vast NHS bureaucracy to self-correct and rein in such excesses." Should be "effort"
I wonder what the potential is for this kind of article to convince idealistic leftists that they are making a mistake. Obviously anyone who doesn't have an emotional or ideological need to believe that a significant minority of kids need new genitals and hormone treatment won't believe that 1% of kids need new genitals and hormone treatment. Most of us are going to look at this and say, "Well, we don't have enough money to put wheels on every fish out there, but we already knew it was crazy, so whatever." But the people you identify as "Left-wing bio-libertarians" don't see the craziness, so maybe a cost-benefit analysis will work?
I see two problems, though. The first problem is that people crazy enough to think our kids need gender reassignment might be so far gone that real-world financial concerns don't seem to be a big deal. They're idealists fighting transphobia; if they run up against economic barriers, they'll just call the economic barriers transphobic. Maybe there are cooler heads around who can be convinced by these arguments to stop financing transition surgeries? I still envision that looking like this:
Beleaguered bureaucrat: "Sorry, we really really would be all in for sex reassignment surgery, you know. Power to the transgendered, and all that. But we just - oof - you know money is so tight right now, and it's--"
Trans activist: "Transphobe!"
The second problem is calling trans activists "left-wing bio-libertarians," which is quite a mouthful and doesn't make sense anyway. I've never met a libertarian who wants to spend other people's money. If you must, call them "gender transhumanists" or "leftist tranhumanists," but if we're going there, frankly the people you're discussing are really idealistic leftists: https://thingstoread.substack.com/i/139095464/the-woke-are-idealistic-not-realistic-and-not-libertarian
I really don't think an argument based on "social solidarity" will work on the postmodern Left and the Andy Chus of the world—aren't they all Rousseau's demented grandchildren who believe that modern society is the root cause of any and all ailments? Don't they all insist that if this thing called Society doesn't reflect back the same beautiful self-flattering reflection they see in the mirror than that means it's ipso facto evll and needs to be destroyed? That because they weren't invited to this party called Norms, then this party needs to be raided by the cops, with maybe the whole building getting burned down too?
"Social solidarity" is exactly what the postmodern Left seeks to destroy, by any means necessary.
This is another illustration of the incoherence of Modernity's dominant Liberal sect. We are all individuals who contract to form society as an instrument for individual ends. We agree to make the sacrifices necessary to sustain this society, even up to the point of risking our own individual death in its defense. We do so because we cannot obtain the individual benefits of the society unless a sufficient proportion of its members agree to the sacrifices and the risk.
What sacrifices are necessary to sustain the society? This is a way of asking, "What is the minimum provision that we must guarantee all individuals to prevent them from abrogating the agreement?" In general, self-interested individuals will be loath to make provisions for things that they themselves don't want, or recognize the general need for. The question of the minimum provision thus becomes the center of politics, with individuals lumping into affinity groups, all trying to shortchange or beggar each other.
That "sufficient proportion of members" willing to sacrifice points to another problem. Why wouldn't a particular individual (or affinity group) try to minimize his own proportion of the sacrifices and risks, and maximize those of others? In the abstract, we can say, "because he realizes that such defections, if universalized, would deprive him of society's benefits." But in practice, this just means that the individual will seek a situation in which he can defect, either without being detected or without being challenged, and others do not or cannot defect. Perhaps he will convince others that their sacrifices "should" be proportionally greater, for some reason. But when it comes down to concrete cases -- the level we actually live on -- specific, effective-immediately decisions about resource allocation, or who has to be the point man for the patrol, must be made. At that point, the individual must make a choice to defect or not to defect. Absent the threat of punishment, why would he choose not to?
So this is a society of free, mutually non-interfering, self-interested individuals, all of whom are rationally trying to shortchange, beggar, or defect on the other signatories to the "social contract." But it isn't like that, you say. People don't act that way.
Why don't they act that way? The answer to that question falsifies our justification for setting up society on this basis in the first place.
What happens if more of them *start* to act that way? We are seeing the results.
So again we see that the left cannot make the trains run on time. Who would have thought that? Nagging hippies are only necessary to remind the ossifying right that there are people in need and that physical power or economic superiority does not equal righteousness. They are in no way suited to hold the reins of power.
The "paradox in postmodern leftism".....Not just 'postmodern', this paradox has been at the heart of leftism - and of the British Labour Party ever since it first managed to form a government in the 1920s. I still remember coming up against this paradox, as a teenager in the 1960s, desperately wanting, teenager-like, for there to be socialist 'Equality' everywhere. My teenage mind tried so hard to square the circle but reality just kept on getting in the way.
Good essay though.
"Like every kind of commons, it relies on people’s willingness to moderate their own desires in light of collective needs and interests."
Mary Harrington just wrote an article ripped from the pages of Adam Smith, "The Wealth of Nations".... Whhhaaaa?!?!?!?!
ROTF....
What you say makes total sense, and yet it’s not being borne out in Canada. We have a 100 percent publicly funded health care system that is actively promoting wrong sex hormones and mutilating surgeries. Our federal government offers $75,000 in health care coverage to employees who want the surgeries to mimic the opposite sex. A court last week decided that the taxpayer-funded health insurance had to pay for a man to have a “neo vagina” constructed while retaining his penis. It’s insane. So we have to ask whose big pockets are pressuring our politicians and institutions to do this?
So, besides injecting m[iracle]RNA COVIDIUS toxic spew into the bodies of children... Adults are also injecting toxic gender mambo jambo into the Thought/Brain of the children!
Lovely societies.