I’m just picturing that robot from Star Trek (the one thinking about “this sentence is false”) going “huh” and then blowing up…
I’m just picturing that robot from Star Trek (the one thinking about “this sentence is false”) going “huh” and then blowing up…
They’re actually a lot more consistent than this post makes them out to be. If you’ve got every single thing on their list that makes you a man - from the genitalia, to the physique, to the likes and dislikes, to the sexual orientation, to the behavior - you’re a man. Same for a woman. If you’re anything less, then they’ve just found their excuse to revoke your humanity in their own minds. You’re different from them, and so now you’re lesser than them. The same thing applies to people of different skin colors, religions, etc.
That’s how those types of people have always been - they think of themselves as “nice people, but only to those who deserve it” which essentially just means a horrible person to everyone but people exactly like themselves. They honestly believe that any less means they’re entirely justified to hate you. All they need is one little thing to point to, and any amount of harassment or worse is “only fair.”
I know it’s easy to believe there’s some consistency there in the form of consistent hatred, but they actually aren’t consistent in their hatred.
I agree with your premise philosophically: They demand that you must have every man trait, to be a man; and similarly for woman traits, to be a woman.
But, consider: only a tiny subset of people would ever be men or women in this formulation. If they believed this strictly and consistently, if they enforced it socially, they would be hopelessly outnumbered. Nobody would ever join the fascism club because nobody would be able to. They’d be wiped out quickly, too, because there would be very few opportunities to pass this ethos down to a following generation.
So in its application, they let all the rules go out the window, as long as you’re saying you agree with them. Jewish person joining an anti-semitic hate group? You’re on the team. Trans person calling for the end of trans healthcare? Welcome aboard. Latino group that opposes immigration? Come on in.
Fascism is about claiming you stand for one thing (which is, due to the nature of fascism, some kind of hate). But then actually taking in any person who is strategically useful to you as long as they don’t rock the boat. The second there’s a good reason to eject someone from the boat, they walk the plank. When it comes to gender, they’ll accept any number of “disqualifying” characteristics–tall and broad-shouldered women, effeminate intellectual men, even literal trans people–as long as you’re on board with hating the bad person of the week.
While that’s true, they still believe you’re lesser if you’re different. The jewish person in the anti-semetic group and the trans person calling for the end of trans healthcare will still be the first on the chopping block if the goals of those groups come to fruition. They’re like pets to them - animals that aren’t on the dinner table only because they serve a better purpose alive than dead.
I think the way I would phrase it is that they are very consistent in their belief that there are clear lines for defining gender.
But that view breaks down the moment their definitions have to engage with reality and they are faced with the difficulty of actually making thos classifications when faced with biological realities.