[AGTRT-BA12] An introduction to my scholarly work on gender

Laurens Buijs
Amsterdam Gender Theory Research Team

Structure of this piece

Introduction: the first Dutch ‘Gender War’
What my scholarly work is about
How the UvA cancelled me because of my gender critical stance
How the image emerged of a far-right transphobe
Conclusion: gender studies yearns for new foundation

Artwork: Tobias Osterhaus

1. Introduction: the first Dutch ‘Gender War’

There has been a lot of fuss recently about me and my scholarly work on gender. I have become the focal point of the first Dutch “Gender War,” as we have seen unfold for several years, particularly in Britain, Canada and the United States. In the process, an idea has developed in the national image that I am a derailed scientist who flirts with the far right and has launched an attack on the LGBT movement. As a result, the content of my scholarly work has been snowed under.

In Section 2, I reflect on my scholarly work by providing a brief summary of 7 recent publications. Four of those publications are currently up for peer-review by international journals. In Section 3, I address the question of exactly where all the commotion at UvA began and how the gender debate on campus was able to escalate. In Section 4, I list how this has been further magnified in the media and national debate and created very damaging images. Finally, in the conclusion, I reflect on the need for a new gender science that leaves hard ideological struggles behind.

2. What my scholarly work on gender is about

I am a founding member of the Amsterdam Gender Theory Research Team, see gender-theory.org. The goal of this research network is to make room for moderate positions in the social and scientific debate on gender, in which people are increasingly creeping to the flanks. On one side are scientists with radical “gender critical positions,” who do not believe in the usefulness and necessity of the distinction between sex and gender, and who want to return to a purely biological interpretation of the sex difference. On the other side are scientists with radical “gender non-critical positions,” who reduce gender to mere self-identification: gender is only how people experience it themselves.

In my scholarly work, I take a moderately gender-critical position. That means I am critical of the non-critical progressive currents in gender studies, which see the difference between male and female merely as a matter of culture, identity or behaviors, and therefore entirely malleable. I believe in limited flexibility of gender, and am therefore critical of what I see as overblown social engineering. My general position summarized in a few points:

In my work, I want to go beyond the simple observation that biological factors play a role in addition to social ones. Indeed, as a follower of the work of philosopher Bruno Latour, I am skeptical of thinking in terms of dual opposites such as nature and culture. Instead, I come up with a triangular approach: gender for me is a combination of biological sex, social construction and personal identity.
In this way, sociological thinking about gender, which focuses only on the flexible and malleable side of gender, is bounded on two sides. In thinking about gender, we will have to relate to the body (which is often binary masculine or feminine) on the one hand, and to consciousness (which allows each person to develop both masculine and feminine personality traits) on the other.
This means that I am critical of claims in the radical currents of the trans movement and gender activism, which argue that each person is free to define their own identity in terms of sex and gender entirely freely and as they see fit. There are certain universal laws and structures in sex and gender that we as human beings have to relate to. In this way, I want to make space for evolutionary and spiritual sides of sexuality and gender.
At the same time, I want to emphasize that there is a small group of people who are truly transgender, gender neutral or intersex. I think it is important for this group to be recognized and accepted, without leading to hype or the misunderstanding that everyone is somewhere on the spectrum between male and female. Human beings are sexually dimorphic (there are two genders), and at the same time there is a small minority group for whom things are a bit more complex. I see it as the job of professionals to arrive at proper diagnostics and to distinguish true transgender people, for example, from those suffering from autogynephilia and Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria.
I am an ardent advocate of assigning a major role to the concept of androgyny in gender studies (see also AGTRT-BA5 and AGTRT-BA21). Androgyny states that all men are also feminine in their personality, and all women are also masculine. Through the concept of androgyny, psychology and biology can be brought into modern gender science to limit sociological thinking without throwing out the idea of gender as malleable and fluid in its entirety.

I would like to reflect here on seven recent publications of mine on gender, four of which are currently submitted to respected international scholarly journals. For each article, I will provide as understandable a brief summary as possible. Also, each article can be read full-text.

Article 1: What we can learn about masculinity and femininity from hunters and gatherers (2021)

Several scientific disciplines (evolutionary biology, primatology, anthropology, philosophy and psychology) show that androgyny played an important role in the genesis of man. Androgyny does not mean that the distinction between the sexes is irrelevant. Androgyny means that men have also begun to develop feminine traits, and women have begun to develop masculine traits.
As men and women began to converge via selection pressure on androgyny, more complex social systems became possible based on horizontal relationships: cooperation, caring and flexibility. This shows that humans are potentially a matriarchal species (see also AGTRT-BA1 and AGTRT-BA9).
It was only during the Neolithic revolution some 12,000 years ago that humans began to live in patriarchal structures (see also AGTRT-BA3). Because humans had to survive in a difficult time, humans began to relate to nature and each other in a different way. With the advent of large-scale agriculture and the nuclear family, gender relations also changed. Emphasis was placed on masculine values such as hierarchy, control and possession.
The present time offers opportunities to transform the patriarchal culture back to a matriarchal culture after 12,000 years.

Article 2: Gender neutrality as a fallacy. Why emancipation cannot exist without masculinity and femininity (2022)

Gender studies is a predominantly sociological field. Failure to look at biology and psychology, for example, has allowed an extreme form of social engineering to take hold. As if the distinction between male and female is only something people make for themselves. Non-binary gender is an example of this social engineering thinking.
Those who also look at knowledge from fields such as biology and psychology come to the conclusion that masculine and feminine are essential building blocks of existence, which are largely “pre-social”: humans encounter them. Gender, on the one hand, is predominantly binary (either m, or v) fixed in biology (body, hormones, genitalia, etc). On the other hand, certain gender structures are also embedded in the psyche. Thus, every human has an androgynous consciousness, and thus access to both male and female personality traits (both m, and v).
If, under the influence of sociological science, we think too lightly about the distinction between m and v, feminism’s and LGBT’s struggle against patriarchy is in jeopardy.

Article 3: Science still struggles with gender. Self-identification has limitations (2023)

Professor Jan Willem Duyvendak argues that non-binary gender is a logical next step in the emancipation of sexuality and gender in the Netherlands. But he looks beyond the problems of social engineering, and its shaky scientific basis.
It is irresponsible to reduce gender to a matter of self-identification. Gender is not determined solely by how we identify ourselves. People can be captivated by trends and hypes. We also see that science is still struggling with the question of how socially engineerable gender is. Gender clinics are reporting increasing problems with diagnostics, treatments and side effects.
Gender dysphoria exists, but professionals will always need to be involved to determine it. It is not yet clear whether non-binary gender really adds anything to transgender on the one hand and androgyny on the other. It is quite possible that much of today’s discomfort with the birth sex will disappear as more space is made for the androgynous core of man.

Article 4: Formal Gender Theory: A Logical Perspective on Dembroff versus Byrne (2023)

I let myself be critical of non-binary gender in Folia of Jan. 18, 2023. The question is whether these statements conflict with an observable consensus in gender theory at the end of the year 2022. To test this, a light formalization is applied that facilitates a systematic approach.
Currently, the challenged statements are not manifestly contrary to any discernible consensus in the literature on gender and sexuality. This, by the way, does not yet scientifically validate the statements.
The literature on gender since 2020 has described and discussed much more far-reaching (i.e., divergent) positions than those I have taken in Folia. For example, the recent debate between Dembroff and Byrne is simply about whether a relevant distinction between sex and gender can be made. One might think that these kinds of questions would have been sufficiently dealt with between 1975 and 2000 in the wake of Simone de Beauvoir’s philosophy, but closer inspection reveals the opposite to be true.

Article 5: Analytical Gender Theory: An Integrating Perspective on Archer versus Bem (2023)

At the University of Amsterdam, I got in trouble over my statements about non-binary gender. This incident shows the need for a gender science with room for gender critical positions without degenerating into ideological strife and moral trench warfare.
To achieve this, an analytical gender theory can be designed, which is concerned with analyzing male and female personality characteristics according to the principle of androgyny, without essentialistically defining gender identity as a whole.
Analytic gender theory represents a triangular approach to gender: biological and psychological sex, socially constructed relationships and personal identity.
Analytical gender theory creates space for both fixed and elastic sides of gender by recognizing the following: 1) sexual dimorphism at the human body level (or that there are two genders, with the possibility of a neutral middle option), 2) the androgynous gender identity of all people, 3) recognition of majorities and minorities in terms of this gender identity (most men are predominantly male, most women are predominantly female), thus ending the total disconnect between sex and gender, 4) clear differentiation between gender identity and LGBT.

Article 6: Gender Triangularity versus Gender Neo-Imperialism plus Neutral versus (An Offending) Nonbinary (2023)

The thesis that self-identification should determine which gender a person is assigned is defended so vigorously and uncompromisingly in the field of gender studies that it is neo-imperialism. It is essential for the free scientific debate on gender that this radical non-gender critical position be criticized.
The term non-binary gender is intrinsically insulting and provocative because a contradiction is created with binary gender, while people who identify as male or female are not necessarily supporters of a binary gender system or identify as binary. A negative term like non-binary gender will have no future as a description of the third “neutral” gender.

Article 7: Biological sex as used in Dembroff v. Byrne (2023)

In the current scientific debate about what exactly defines a man or a woman, there is no clear definition of biological sex. This weakens the argument of both the progressive and conservative (gender critical) positions.
Even with the strictest definition of biological sex, there will be cases that, according to both extremes in the debate, do not qualify as male or female, and from which it follows that the distinction between sex and gender makes sense.

These seven articles show that I am pursuing a fundamental change in the field of gender studies. Strengthening analytical gender theory with at its heart the concept of androgyny is one of my great priorities. In my view, such a movement is needed to establish new foundations for gender studies, a field currently in crisis due to excessive ideologization. For example, I am currently working on a philosophical publication on androgyny, in which I explain exactly how androgyny is expressed on four different levels: consciousness, the body, social relations and society. Given the great social importance of a new, scientifically solid approach to gender and sexuality, I am also working on a public book called The Androgynous Man.

Because androgyny ultimately has consciousness as its source, it also creates the opportunity to connect analytical gender theory with spiritual insights from indigenous cultures and mystical wisdom traditions. Moreover, a philosophically fundamental dissection of the origins of androgyny and how androgyny works as a process allows for a general definition of masculine and feminine, in relation to each other. Such a definition is necessary to give analytic gender theory future: after all, it revolves around distinguishing male and female personality traits.

3. How the UvA cancelled me because of my gender critical position

In an opinion piece in the Folia this January, I came out of the closet as a whistleblower of serious institutional abuses in social sciences at the UvA. Among other things, I then talked about my work on gender and my critique of non-binary gender. I take what I call a “gender critical” stance in the debate on gender. In the January 18 article on the Folia site, I called non-binary gender “an empty hype in modern society” and a “dangerous and pseudoscientific aberration.”

Later that day, the article went viral on social media, and the next day I was on NPO Radio 1 to comment on my article. Then all hell broke loose at UvA, where on Jan. 20 both students and UvA management distanced themselves from me. The students accused me of homophobia and transphobia in a “trigger warning” on Instragram, demanding that my opinion piece be banned and that I be suspended as a teacher.

The director of my ISW program, Michaëla Hordijk, wrote a message to staff later that day, describing my expressions about non-binary gender as “hurtful,” which “the program – faculty, management and support team – emphatically distance themselves” from. Suddenly my science-based statements were known to be hurtful and disrespectful.

“The program – teachers, management and support team – emphatically distances itself from Mr. Buijs’ judgments and hurtful expressions of non-binarity. ISW is an education where everyone is welcome and can count on respect for his/her/its identity.”
Michaëla Hordijk, ISW program director, University of Amsterdam

This message also leaked that day to Het Parool, which reported later that day that the UvA had “distanced itself” from me and my scholarly work on non-binary gender.

Suddenly I had become a controversial figure in left-progressive circles and at the UvA. And that while I am gay myself, I have been committed to LGBT emancipation for 20 years, I have been explicitly committed to the emancipation of transgender people as well, and moreover, I have also been researching and publishing on sexuality and gender as a social scientist at the UvA for 15 years.

In recent months, the UvA has not only failed to provide any protection for me and my scholarly work, but its management and board have emphatically sided with radical woke activists who take a stand against my work based on ideological arguments.

From the UvA, meanwhile, more and more restrictions were imposed on me. I was no longer allowed contact with my principal and immediate colleagues, I was no longer allowed to teach, and I was eventually not even allowed on campus or in the library. A meeting I had organized on academic freedom had to be cancelled at the behest of the Maggot House. My repeated requests and appeals to organize a debate on campus about gender in order to channel the unrest and polarization that had arisen into academic channels were ignored.

4. How the image emerged of a far-right transphobe

Meanwhile, all sorts of attacks were launched against me through the media. All kinds of radical-left spokesmen saw that I was tipsy game and that I was outlawed because the UvA offered me no institutional protection. Thus, I could be increasingly dismissed as a derailed scientist, who fell into the far-right path and abused his position to spread hateful ideology.

That image was increasingly reinforced as the left-liberal establishment media closed its doors to me, and I relied mostly on alternative and right-wing media. This dynamic made me particularly vulnerable to attacks from leftists and intellectuals. And so those attacks came en masse. Some low points in a row:

Professor Jan Willem Duyvendak refuses to host debate on UvA campus. He does, however, accuse me in NRC of political bias and ignorance. He also compares me to the early homophobes of the 20th century.
UvA Professor of Gender & Sexuality Sarah Bracke refuses to host debate on UvA campus. She does compare my gender-critical position in the Groene Amsterdammer to people who believe in the flat earth, and on Twitter she equates criticism of woke (thus including my own gender-critical position) with the extreme right.
Education Minister Robert Dijkgraaf accused me in the House of Representatives of hurting and dehumanizing non-binary people.
Higher education media board members boycotted a conference at the University of Groningen because I was going to attend, and later canceled my attendance altogether.
NOS distanced itself from an appearance by me on the NOS News because I would be too controversial.
BNNVARA accuses me of being an “anti-transextremist” who would be in “far-right circles.”
BNNVARA links me to an alleged stalking of Abdelkader Benali in the street.
Broadcaster HUMAN tackles me in the program Mediastorm, in which I am dismissed as a “danger to LGBT” who is not concerned with the interests of the LGBT community but only with self-profiling.

Following the attacks from several public broadcasters against me, I decided to instruct my lawyer to send the NPO a summons.

Ik heb mijn advocaat opdracht gegeven om @NOS en @BNNVARA te sommeren om hun berichtgeving over mij nav mijn optreden in NOS Journaal van 10 april jl. te rectificeren. Als zij in gebreke blijven zullen zij in rechte worden betrokken en zal ik de rechter verzoeken hen tot…
— Laurens Buijs (@laurensbuijs) April 14, 2023

I warned about extreme scapegoating dynamics against me back in January, and from the list above, that has only further escalated over the following weeks and months. I can imagine that all this imaging makes it difficult for an average person to assess exactly what my substantive position on gender looks like. Hence this article.

5. Conclusion: gender studies yearns for new foundation

The current field of gender studies no longer functions well. At least not at the University of Amsterdam, as evidenced by my unjust and unscientific exclusion from the institution, and the demeaning way in which I have been treated by the academic community for dead wrong and scientifically based views.

But the problem is deeper than just the UvA. The field of gender studies itself is adrift. In the current debate, increasingly radical positions are being taken that uncompromisingly defend and imperialistically impose the ideal of self-identification. Those who object can be dismissed as transphobic, or worse, suspended or fired. All the while, self-identification has no scientific basis, and is on collision course with the activist agenda of feminists and LGBT against patriarchy.

With my role as a whistleblower and with my recent scholarly work, I hope to contribute to the much-needed renewal of the field of gender studies so that scholars can once again show leadership with legitimate authority in an increasingly polarizing social debate.

I would like to conclude by thanking Jan Bergstra, Emeritus Professor of Computer Science at the University of Amsterdam. The passion and energy he developed over a short period of time for my wonderful field shows that gender studies has the potential to appeal to a wide range of people, provided it puts its house in order and gets rid of its own rampant ideologizing. I want to thank him for his substantive contributions from logic, and for his professional guidance in writing the pieces.