Apr 26·edited Apr 26Liked by From Ritual to Romance
Stephanie, I have a lot to say about your article, but I have other things to say that would be better said in an email (if you are willing).
Great article. I see so much wisdom in it. If you came up with these ideas on your own, you are absolutely brilliant. I have similar ideas, but in my case I got them from other people (e.g., books) but at least I had the sense to recognize the truth in them.
I am anti-trans but not anti-trans PEOPLE. Like you, I question the ideology, which is full of nonsense. Trans people are trying to bend society to their will, which is a tall order given how few of them there are. The purpose of their ideology is to normalize them. In other words, if what makes a man a real man is to FEEL like a man, then it doesn't matter whether you have a penis or vagina in your pants. That's absurd, of course. Gender is determined by the body and always has been. I will admit to one thing: the mixing of male and female in one person strikes me as weird, and I can't get over that weirdness, so my anti-transgenderism does have a basis in my natural prejudices. Like you, I'll use he/him and she/her pronouns to be respectful, but I won't do the they/them thing.
What I really want to do is to share the Seth Material with you. An author of fiction and poetry by the name of Jane Roberts "channeled" a soul or spirit who called himself "Seth" from late 1963 to 1984, when she died. She lived in upstate New York. The text of those channeled sessions is called the Seth Material. It is contained in about twenty volumes which have sold about ten million copies since the 1960s. The Seth Material has become my religion. There are a lot of reasons why I believe in the Material so deeply, but I won’t go into them right now. I will say quickly, however, that the readings were given in a very open and well documented way, and that the quality of the ideas in the Material is TOTALLY OFF THE SCALE.
Seth made it clear that there is reality and fantasy in the universe. The reality part of it is so flexible that it results in the ability of individuals (souls, entities, spirits -- use whatever word you want) to construct fantasy realities for themselves to live in. The Earth is one of those places. Indeed, all of physical life is a fantasy of sorts because the natural state of all life is energy-based or what you might call spiritual.
Imagine that a group of people put on a play, but they become so entranced by the story unfolding in the play that they forget that it is just a play and they are just actors. That is somewhat similar to the situation we are in. The Earth is the stage/theater, and the “actors” are the souls of all the people and other life forms who are putting on the play. All of the physical things we live with are just props in the play.
Seth said that our natural state is a spiritual one. We each have an “inner self”, which lives outside our physical framework. The task of the inner self is to keep the “play” going. Alternatively, imagine that we are living on a holodeck (a la Star Trek). The reality within the holodeck is being created moment to moment. Keeping the story in the holodeck going is partially what our inner self does. Our inner self takes its cues as to what to create in our lives by looking into our minds, thoughts and beliefs – to that extent, we are in something of a feedback loop. When we pray, it is basically our inner self which answers.
I want to keep talking but there is probably a limit to how much I can write here. Seth/Roberts gave a full explanation of everything: Who God is, who we are, what our place in the universe is, how our physical world is constructed, what happens when we die, how long we live, etc. The psychic Edgar Cayce (who died in 1951, I think) said similar things, but Roberts was much more eloquent.
I hope you'll contact me via email. I just did a test and I can receive emails via my Substack. My email address is perryjames@substack.com.
You could take this to the final step..."These labels aren't real"....and extend the unrealness to the very self itself. Buddhism argues there is 'no self' and it's something Buddhists strive to understand, because when there is no 'self', there is no suffering and pain. Pain (not physical...your body is a different matter) comes from our concern for the 'self'. Buddhism argues there is no self because everything can be broken down into something else. you are the product of your parents, they are the products of their parents, the food you eat was created by water and sunlight and photosynthesis and other animals regenerating and people in factories manufacturing food who they themselves came from something else...as did the machines they use....made out of metals and minerals out of the ground, and if you break it down further you return the elements to the Big Bang, from whence some of them came, and the supernova that came after it, from whence the rest came.
Carl Sagan said we are made of starstuff, and the Buddhists would agree.
However to state that transwomen are exactly the same as natal women is sheer gaslighting and buffoonery. Clearly they're not; your nephew is never going to impregnate anyone, and my friend's kid's transwife is never going to carry a baby in her belly and push it out between her legs like her spouse did. At some point, biology IS destiny, and your body doesn't care how you 'identify'.
Funny how the transfolk don't want anyone to deny that biological reality, and accuse others of not catering to their fantasies as 'dehumanizaing' them. Poppycock! If they're human they're human, regardless of how they were born or how they try to transform themselves. If you were born a fe/male and die a fe/male, you die a human. Most folks, even critics, aren't telling transfolks "You're not human," they're denying vociferously a fantasy they're not buying into. But don't try to cross race! That's a no-no!
Was just reading today about the lesser-known 'transableism' - people with a particular identity disorder who feel they were 'meant' to be disabled in some way - blind, in a wheelchair, etc. This poses rather a problem for doctors when they come to them asking to be somehow disabled - this goes directly against the Hippocratic oath.
And frankly, I would find that offensive, if I may be so judgemental, when there are so many genuinely disabled person who would probably love to live like others. however you feel about disabled rights, they will never know certain joys the rest of us experience because of some limitation of their bodies.
Unfortunately, the trans movement has become quite vitriolic and misogynist and I strongly suspect most of th hostility to them comes not from genuine transphobes (who exist) but people who react to the hate and hostility and vicious abuse of a British author who has NEVER uttered the lies transfolk have attributed to her. A few weeks ago on Twitter, she called them out as being exactly like her ex-husband, who was quite abusive. I'm glad she's saying it, because I want to explore the misogyny and male narcissism so centered in trans-activism.
Stephanie, I have a lot to say about your article, but I have other things to say that would be better said in an email (if you are willing).
Great article. I see so much wisdom in it. If you came up with these ideas on your own, you are absolutely brilliant. I have similar ideas, but in my case I got them from other people (e.g., books) but at least I had the sense to recognize the truth in them.
I am anti-trans but not anti-trans PEOPLE. Like you, I question the ideology, which is full of nonsense. Trans people are trying to bend society to their will, which is a tall order given how few of them there are. The purpose of their ideology is to normalize them. In other words, if what makes a man a real man is to FEEL like a man, then it doesn't matter whether you have a penis or vagina in your pants. That's absurd, of course. Gender is determined by the body and always has been. I will admit to one thing: the mixing of male and female in one person strikes me as weird, and I can't get over that weirdness, so my anti-transgenderism does have a basis in my natural prejudices. Like you, I'll use he/him and she/her pronouns to be respectful, but I won't do the they/them thing.
What I really want to do is to share the Seth Material with you. An author of fiction and poetry by the name of Jane Roberts "channeled" a soul or spirit who called himself "Seth" from late 1963 to 1984, when she died. She lived in upstate New York. The text of those channeled sessions is called the Seth Material. It is contained in about twenty volumes which have sold about ten million copies since the 1960s. The Seth Material has become my religion. There are a lot of reasons why I believe in the Material so deeply, but I won’t go into them right now. I will say quickly, however, that the readings were given in a very open and well documented way, and that the quality of the ideas in the Material is TOTALLY OFF THE SCALE.
Seth made it clear that there is reality and fantasy in the universe. The reality part of it is so flexible that it results in the ability of individuals (souls, entities, spirits -- use whatever word you want) to construct fantasy realities for themselves to live in. The Earth is one of those places. Indeed, all of physical life is a fantasy of sorts because the natural state of all life is energy-based or what you might call spiritual.
Imagine that a group of people put on a play, but they become so entranced by the story unfolding in the play that they forget that it is just a play and they are just actors. That is somewhat similar to the situation we are in. The Earth is the stage/theater, and the “actors” are the souls of all the people and other life forms who are putting on the play. All of the physical things we live with are just props in the play.
Seth said that our natural state is a spiritual one. We each have an “inner self”, which lives outside our physical framework. The task of the inner self is to keep the “play” going. Alternatively, imagine that we are living on a holodeck (a la Star Trek). The reality within the holodeck is being created moment to moment. Keeping the story in the holodeck going is partially what our inner self does. Our inner self takes its cues as to what to create in our lives by looking into our minds, thoughts and beliefs – to that extent, we are in something of a feedback loop. When we pray, it is basically our inner self which answers.
I want to keep talking but there is probably a limit to how much I can write here. Seth/Roberts gave a full explanation of everything: Who God is, who we are, what our place in the universe is, how our physical world is constructed, what happens when we die, how long we live, etc. The psychic Edgar Cayce (who died in 1951, I think) said similar things, but Roberts was much more eloquent.
I hope you'll contact me via email. I just did a test and I can receive emails via my Substack. My email address is perryjames@substack.com.
You could take this to the final step..."These labels aren't real"....and extend the unrealness to the very self itself. Buddhism argues there is 'no self' and it's something Buddhists strive to understand, because when there is no 'self', there is no suffering and pain. Pain (not physical...your body is a different matter) comes from our concern for the 'self'. Buddhism argues there is no self because everything can be broken down into something else. you are the product of your parents, they are the products of their parents, the food you eat was created by water and sunlight and photosynthesis and other animals regenerating and people in factories manufacturing food who they themselves came from something else...as did the machines they use....made out of metals and minerals out of the ground, and if you break it down further you return the elements to the Big Bang, from whence some of them came, and the supernova that came after it, from whence the rest came.
Carl Sagan said we are made of starstuff, and the Buddhists would agree.
However to state that transwomen are exactly the same as natal women is sheer gaslighting and buffoonery. Clearly they're not; your nephew is never going to impregnate anyone, and my friend's kid's transwife is never going to carry a baby in her belly and push it out between her legs like her spouse did. At some point, biology IS destiny, and your body doesn't care how you 'identify'.
Funny how the transfolk don't want anyone to deny that biological reality, and accuse others of not catering to their fantasies as 'dehumanizaing' them. Poppycock! If they're human they're human, regardless of how they were born or how they try to transform themselves. If you were born a fe/male and die a fe/male, you die a human. Most folks, even critics, aren't telling transfolks "You're not human," they're denying vociferously a fantasy they're not buying into. But don't try to cross race! That's a no-no!
Was just reading today about the lesser-known 'transableism' - people with a particular identity disorder who feel they were 'meant' to be disabled in some way - blind, in a wheelchair, etc. This poses rather a problem for doctors when they come to them asking to be somehow disabled - this goes directly against the Hippocratic oath.
And frankly, I would find that offensive, if I may be so judgemental, when there are so many genuinely disabled person who would probably love to live like others. however you feel about disabled rights, they will never know certain joys the rest of us experience because of some limitation of their bodies.
Unfortunately, the trans movement has become quite vitriolic and misogynist and I strongly suspect most of th hostility to them comes not from genuine transphobes (who exist) but people who react to the hate and hostility and vicious abuse of a British author who has NEVER uttered the lies transfolk have attributed to her. A few weeks ago on Twitter, she called them out as being exactly like her ex-husband, who was quite abusive. I'm glad she's saying it, because I want to explore the misogyny and male narcissism so centered in trans-activism.