{"id":9042,"date":"2023-11-28T11:56:52","date_gmt":"2023-11-28T10:56:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/2023\/11\/28\/agtrt-bdf24-the-sputtering-of-the-nederterfjes-does-not-change-their-outdated-position-on-gender\/"},"modified":"2024-05-07T07:28:25","modified_gmt":"2024-05-07T05:28:25","slug":"agtrt-bdf24-the-sputtering-of-the-nederterfjes-does-not-change-their-outdated-position-on-gender","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/2023\/11\/28\/agtrt-bdf24-the-sputtering-of-the-nederterfjes-does-not-change-their-outdated-position-on-gender\/","title":{"rendered":"[AGTRT-BF24] The complaints of the Dutch TERFs do not change their outdated position on gender"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Jan Bergstra & Laurens Buijs<\/strong>
Amsterdam Gender Theory Research Team<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our blog AGTRT-BF23<\/a>, which qualifies supporters of VOORZIJ as TERF, was not welcomed by VOORZIJ, as we can tell from their complaints on social media. We seem to need to understand that for them it is not about gender but about sex. But transgendering is thus precisely about gender and precisely not about sex. This is nothing new and we really didn’t come up with it ourselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read more about our critique of the VOORZIJ Foundation:
<\/em>Dutch TERFs of VOORZIJ Foundation cling to outdated positions on gender<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We simply observe that the expressions of representatives of VOORZIJ are feminist, radical and trans-exclusionary<\/em>. We translate that last word as, “exclusively to the idea of gender transition.” In this way, we justify the qualification TERF (which stands for “trans-exclusionary radical feminist<\/em>“).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the sake of brevity, we reiterate that TERF is often wrongly applied as a “swear word,” for example, at the direction of J.K. Rowling (see AGTRT-BF12<\/a>). But in the context of VOORZIJ, we see nothing that would show that the qualification TERF would be incorrect. We can also see that representatives of VOORZIJ allow themselves a rather pejorative style, which does not show respect for people with different views. But he who kicks the ball can expect it back; hence “NederTERFjes.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A modern definition of man (woman) is: adult person of male (female) gender. For further explanation, see several of our reports at gender-thery.org<\/a>. The TERF position then is “gender = sex.” And because gender cannot change (incidentally, a matter of choice of definition of gender, see our report AGTRT-4<\/a>), in the TERF mindset, a woman cannot become a man and a man cannot become a woman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But surely the progress of the past 150 years has now been to recognize that gender has a flexibility that sex does not have. At the same time, a battle rages over the definition of gender, for indeed people may view it differently. We advocate a Middle of the Road (MotR) idea of gender in which biological sex remains an important factor in determining gender, while still providing the flexibility that persons with gender dysphoria so need. MotR calls for a workable compromise between (gender) essentialism and (gender) co-essentialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Learn more about our MotR approach to gender:<\/em>
Our middle-of-the-road approach to gender is the middle of seven flavors of gender theory<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nathan Schneider’s article called “The trouble with gender ideology<\/a>” in America, the Jesuit review<\/em> provides a readable and also persuasive case for seeking a MotR form of gender theory. He thereby criticizes the views one often hears from the official channels of the Roman Catholic Church, which are very similar to those of the TERFs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The NederTERFjes give us the impression of never wanting to read a line of literature on gender theory, of not wanting to know anything about it at all, and, as far as we can tell, never even thinking for a second about responding substantively to arguments. This is a pity, because the Netherlands so urgently needs a good gender-critical movement that is also willing to engage in serious substantive debate. Gender-critical feminists in the Netherlands who have not yet been radicalized would benefit greatly from looking at this text in detail from an unsuspicious angle. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read more about the importance of a gender-critical movement in the Netherlands:
<\/em>The Netherlands needs a gender-critical movement<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We think Nathan Schneider does skip a bit easily over the problems posed by Judith Butler’s views (he portrays Judith Butler as more MotR than seems right to us), and we would like to use other arguments there in part. But Schneider’s argument does not hang at all on his reading of Butler. His argument is simply “from scratch” so to speak.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the spectrum of Dutch political movements, we find our MotR idea most prevalent at NSC. PVV, FvD and JA21 seem to be closer to the TERF position (albeit those movements are not feminist). Bij1, PvdA-GL and D66 have moved too much toward co-essentialism by our standards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jan Bergstra & Laurens BuijsAmsterdam Gender Theory Research Team Our blog AGTRT-BF23, which qualifies supporters of VOORZIJ as TERF, was not welcomed by VOORZIJ, as we can tell from their complaints on social media. We seem to need to understand that for them it is not about gender but about sex. But transgendering is thus […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":94225296,"featured_media":5524,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"federate","footnotes":""},"categories":[770841050],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9042","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-formal-gender-theory-en"],"rttpg_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/edd01-img_6464.jpg",3000,1750,false],"landscape":["https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/edd01-img_6464.jpg",3000,1750,false],"portraits":["https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/edd01-img_6464.jpg",3000,1750,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/edd01-img_6464.jpg",150,88,false],"medium":["https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/edd01-img_6464.jpg",300,175,false],"large":["https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/edd01-img_6464.jpg",1024,597,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/edd01-img_6464.jpg",1536,896,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/edd01-img_6464.jpg",2048,1195,false]},"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"Laurens Buijs","author_link":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/author\/laurensjanbuijs\/"},"rttpg_comment":0,"rttpg_category":"Formal Gender Theory<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"Jan Bergstra & Laurens BuijsAmsterdam Gender Theory Research Team Our blog AGTRT-BF23, which qualifies supporters of VOORZIJ as TERF, was not welcomed by VOORZIJ, as we can tell from their complaints on social media. We seem to need to understand that for them it is not about gender but about sex. But transgendering is thus…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9042","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/94225296"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9042"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9042\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9564,"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9042\/revisions\/9564"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9042"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9042"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gender-theory.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9042"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}