Book Review: Who’s Afraid of Gender – Judith Butler (Part 2)

You Can’t Legislate Gravity

Continued from Book Review: Who’s Afraid of Gender – Judith Butler (Part 1)

Contemporary attacks on gender in the United States

[conservatives] know that developing autonomous judgement is an educational goal, and they fear that potential, that freedom to think, more than they fear indoctrination. … They want to quash critical thought in the name of doctrine, and, by way of an inadvertently confessional projection, assume their adversaries want the same.
Page 98

I am sorry, my American friends, but your education system is known overseas as not teaching critical thinking – an essential skill for democracy.

If enough people in a population cannot think critically, the risk of an authoritarian element taking control is much increased.

Recognising difference, and exploring it, offers people an opportunity to see the world in different ways – ways that may not be convenient to those seeking to control the state.

It is feminism that has most clearly opposed rape and assault, and it is LGBTQIA+ movements that have opposed bullying and violence. And yet, in this phantasmatic transfiguration, the body is penetrated by these “ideologies” was it those who have taught us most about sexual consent and it autonomy are the ones who are violating both principles and their teaching.
Page 102

Isn’t it fascinating that those men who most oppose feminism and LGBTQIA+, are the very ones who get accused of indecent assault and violating the vulnerable – whether that’s priests or presidents.

If “love” has been reduced to compulsory heterosexuality and hatred has propagated distortions of its own making to justify incendiary attacks on critical thinking, social movements for freedom and justice, gender and race studies, and academic freedom, then it is all those who seek to live and breathe in freedom and equality who suffer most by being transfigured into demonic and dangerous forces. Not only are the principles of freedom and equality under attack, but so are all those who require those principles to live.
Page 111

Summing up this chapter, where Butler points out the hypocrisy of “pro-lifers” in their belief in the primacy of the foetus and their lack of care for the human when born.

Of particular interest to the eunuch community is the growing conflict over bodily autonomy; by seeking to prevent discussion of gender, sexuality, and race in schools, combined with shutting down mental and physical healthcare for both children and adults, the ability for children or adults to be fully autonomous and authentic, and above all happy, is blocked. Many take the only way out of this problem that they can: self harm and, perhaps, suicide.

Throughout her writing, Butler points out the contradictions in the anti-gender movement. I found this quite online, and the desperation, frustration, and humour in it delightfully illustrates what Butler is saying:

I mean explain this we banned trans people in sports because they are much too tough, and then we turn around and ban them from the armed services because they are too weak… I mean make it make sense for me could you, please?
https://poeaxtryspoetryprism.blog/2025/05/10/daily-prompt-9/#like-847

Trump, Sex, and the Supreme Court

they term “gender” does not deny the materiality of the body, but only asks how it is framed
Page 112

When it comes to “dangly bits”, sex is (largely) a biological fact which (for many) belongs to the realm of the obvious, however, the presentation of gender, the way a gender acts, devoted itself, expresses itself, can be multifaceted. She does contend that sex as an immutable fact requires quite a bit of work – since we don’t all share the same view on what is “obvious” and anxiomatic.

It occurs to me, that governments seeking to impose “sex” and “gender” definitions legally are trying to legislate on the natural world: they might as well dictate the pull of gravity. Legislate all they want: gravity is what gravity is, trans and queer people will be whatever we are. You cannot make laws to stop people existing. They just make life more difficult than it needs to be.

This was for Trump … than a move meant to secure a sexual world order that fortifies patriarchy and heteronormativity, and his presumably organised by white norms.
Page 116

The resistance to this premise is simple: if one is discriminated against because of what another judged on5es sex to be, it didn’t actually matter whether the other person’s judgement of sex is accurate but that they had acted with discrimination. This argument was enough for the Supreme Court, in Trump’s first presidency, to overturn his dictates on sex and gender.

In other words, there was no need to decide what “sex” actually meant in order to decide that discrimination has occurred.

For example, if a cis-male was refused service because they were right to be a trans-man, the root of the discrimination doesn’t matter.

Very few people who discriminate on the basis of sex see or know true anatomy, the hormonal or genetic composition of the person against whom they discriminate.
Page 122

Back to the current bathroom debacle: who is actually going to check what’s contained within the underwear of somebody in a particular bathroom? Will there be a strip search? A DNA test? Or a check on which is the dominate hormone in the person’s body? Of course not. Somebody is just going to look at another person and say to themselves “they look a bit too masculine/feminine for that particular convenience”. It’s a subjective judgement, to put it crudely: “she’s too ugly for the ladies” and “he’s to pretty for the gents”. Seriously. Is that the actual way toilet policing is going to work?

Butler examines in detail a US Supreme Court ruling (by a conservative judge no less!), that stated that permitting a person to do one thing based on their perceived sex and not permitting it to another based on their perceived sex was sex discrimination.

So next time someone insists we “just follow the science” – ask them which one. Because if their science is measuring chromosomes at the bathroom door, I’m going to need a lab coat and a front-row seat for the absurdity.

Continued…