A few days ago, Governor Ron DeSantis announced a ban on paediatric gender transition in Florida.
It has, in other words, taken a conservative administration to enact legislation aimed at protecting healthy under-18s (many of whom will grow up to be normal, well-adjusted gay and lesbian adults if left alone) from severe iatrogenic harms including double mastectomy, sterilisation, osteoporosis, cognitive impairment, and even blindness. And this, I humbly suggest, should invite some reflection amid those gender-critical feminist currently debating whether or not it’s ever acceptable to ‘align’ with the Right in resisting gender ideology.
This has been bitterly divisive recently. But to my eye, it’s a serious question: given a choice between losing heroically, or winning but (as you see it) getting your hands dirty, is the victory worth the price?
This question has long bedevilled political radicals of all stripes. And to the best of my understanding, where gender-critical feminism is concerned the answer from many quarters is: no. From this perspective, Right-wing opponents of gender ideology are too antifeminist in too many other respects, for example in their frequent oppostion to abortion (which DeSantis recently legislated to ban after 15 weeks’ gestation). To many Left-wing gender-critical feminists, then, coalition with the Right is viewed as likely to do more harm than good.
And perhaps it’s not for me, a mere theorist (not to mention one that’s probably already irredeemably radioactive from a Left-wing perspective) to pronounce on this question. But what is clear is that historically speaking, a great many changes now narrated as straightforwardly feminist ones were brought about via a coalition not all of whose members were ideologically aligned - and some have subsequently been politely downplayed.
Abortion is a case in point. The legalisation of abortion was achieved with some considerable help from early twentieth-century eugenicist movements, both in the UK and the US. Marie Stopes, for example, argued that reproductive technologies would improve humanity by helping to weed out the stupid, the weak, the degenerate and many others she considered undesirable:
When Bills are passed to ensure the sterility of the hopelessly rotten and racially diseased, and to provide for the education of the child-bearing woman so that she spaces her children healthily, our race will rapidly quell the stream of depraved, hopeless and wretched lives which are at present ever increasing in proportion in our midst.
The presence of such profoundly disturbing views among those who helped bring about a keystone policy of modern feminism has not, however, stopped the political gain being defended - even as every mention of Stopes (and, in the United States, Margaret Sanger) has been expunged from the institutions they founded.
We can argue the toss about whether legal abortion was in the end, unambiguously a win for women; in Feminism Against Progress I’ll make the case that over time its ‘benefits’ have been a two-edged sword. The point in this context is about unsavoury bedfellows. Let’s assume that the feminists who made common cause with eugenicists to legalise abortion didn’t do so because they wanted to rid the world of disabled people; they still collaborated to bring about legislative change.
As I’ve previously argued, gender ideology isn’t being contested on the field of theory so much as via institutional trench warfare. Winning that fight, or even not giving ground, means taking, and wielding, actual power. I’ve been on the pessimistic side in some recent writing, about the medium-term prognosis for democracy in the digital age. But just to be perverse, and argue against myself, DeSantis’ move to ban paediatric transition offers a cheering counterpoint, in that it suggests “win power, then legislate” remains a viable means of effecting political change.
But this is provided you have the numbers. This means gender-critical feminists keen to make use of the democratic process to resist gender ideology will need numbers, in order to enact any substantial policies to curb the reach of gender ideology.
In Britain, despite Keir Starmer’s recent squirming on the topic, it should be clear that this is unlikely to be within the Labour Party. On the other side of the Atlantic, it’s certainly not within the Democrats. Given this, gender critical activists need to think concretely about where the numbers actually are.
The answer to this is highly unlikely to be among the far-right groupuscules that sometimes trigger controversy by showing up at gender-critical protests, but whose membership is in truth vanishingly small compared to the electorate overall. But while these can just be ignored, it’s not realistic to imagine that there exists a coalition, that’s both broad enough to move the needle in legislative terms but also ideologically Left-wing enough to avoid even the most homeopathic taint of conservatism.
The inference is clear. Politics is a dirty business. Alliances don’t last forever. The question is what matters more. Do you want unimpeachable principles? Or do you want to win?
The price of victory is (temporarily) your principles
I am a 67-year-old man and a lifelong Democrat voter and activist. Starting last June in the open California primary, I voted straight Republican (and did so again in the November election). I will continue to vote Republican for the forseeable future, and turn my activism towards getting as many Republicans as possible elected.
I do so because I view the mutilation and sterilization of children as a crime against humanity. I view allowing men (and so-called "trans women" are men) in women's spaces, places, and events (eg sports) as hate crimes against women.
These issues are, for me, the most important issues. I disagree with Republicans on almost everything else (including abortion, where I favor an absolute right to abortion for any reason up until birth), but I just care more about stopping these crimes against humanity and hate crimes, which Democrats universally support.
I could not care less about "getting my hands dirty", or whatever the fuck. I want to stop the crimes, period, by any and all means necessary. I will vote for Donald Trump in 2024 if the Democrats have not come to their senses by then (and there is no sign that they will).
‘Feminism’ as a movement is dead. When women aren’t going to stand up for women, you’re just no longer relevant. Gender ideology today is literally about abusing and maiming children and minors. Science has shown that the brain’s frontal cortex doesn’t even come together until around 25 years of age. It’s laughable that gender activists believe that maiming children before they’ve fully matured is a good thing.