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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   34968 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 6, 2023

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True, but this is not the complaint at hand--it's what is done with rapists that is at the heart of the dispute.

I beg your pardon, but my Google skills are momentarily not up to snuff. What is being done with rapists?

  • -10

Some dude gets convicted for raping women. He's sent to prison. In prison, he discovers that he's actually a trans woman, and so needs to be transfered to the women's prison. The authorities go along with it. Women prisoners get raped by the "trans woman" rapist who is bigger and stronger than them, and has a fully-functional dick.

In that case, existing protections against rape in general should be enough. It shouldn't be difficult for the guards to observe creepy behavior leading up to any incident, for example. If the guards fail to prevent rape by a trans woman, then they would've failed to prevent any other sort of abuse between inmates. I continue to not see a problem with trans rights here.

Also, I don't think this is a problem, statistically speaking. I currently think every other possible sex offense that could go on in a prison is way ahead of this one in frequency. I would be interested in seeing some numbers on this. I am aware of some news articles on the topic, but see Man bites dog:

The phrase man bites dog is a shortened version of an aphorism in journalism that describes how an unusual, infrequent event (such as a man biting a dog) is more likely to be reported as news than an ordinary, everyday occurrence with similar consequences, such as a dog biting a man.

In that case, existing protections against rape in general should be enough.

The existing protections, i.e. keeping male rapists away from women, is being actively subverted.

It shouldn't be difficult for the guards to observe creepy behavior leading up to any incident, for example.

That's not how it works. I doubt you can prevent rapes simply by "observing creepy behavior". And even if you could, there's still the fundamental problem of legibility. Let's say a guard does in fact notice some behavior that they consider to be creepy. What do they do then? If they take any sort of disciplinary action it's not hard for one to argue that it's overkill and say just because there's creepy behavior doesn't mean a rape has been committed yet. It's the same problem as the cops being called to a domestic dispute, then being unable to do anything because they didn't personally witness anything illegal happening, and they can't just take someone else's word for it. This idea of recognizing creepy behavior sounds like one of those ideas that only makes sense in hindsight after an incident has occurred, yet isn't workable in practice.

Also, come on. Are you really suggesting that it's easier for guards to "just prevent rape" than it is to place trans women rapists in men's prisons?

If the guards fail to prevent rape by a trans woman, then they would've failed to prevent any other sort of abuse between inmates.

This does not follow. There are all sorts of offenses a guard must prevent, and rape isn't equivalent to all of them in difficulty or observability. So them failing to prevent rape doesn't give us any information about what other things they have failed to prevent.

Besides, the easiest way to prevent men raping women isn't to have guards on duty. It's just keeping male rapists away from women.

I continue to not see a problem with trans rights here.

Trans rights have resulted in demonstrable negative externalities to other people. These externalities would straightforwardly not have happened if there weren't trans rights. It's as simple as that.

Also, I don't think this is a problem, statistically speaking.

Okay so, using statistics to triage the collective effort we spend on problems (and thus dismissing statistically insignificant problems) only makes sense if it would take too much effort to eliminate them. In this case however, the effort is relatively easy. All we have to do is not put male rapists in the same building as women. In fact, that's what we were doing before, until trans rights activists rolled around and demanded we do otherwise.

They're being put in women's prisons, for example.

If rapists - people who have raped - are put in with the general population of prisoners, that's a failure in and of itself and doesn't have anything to do with trans people.

And if a male rapist is put in a female prison, then it's an even greater failure of the prison system, and it does have something to do with trans people.

This claim (hypothetical male rapist becomes trans, is transferred to women's prison without care or thought, then commences raping other defenseless women inmates who are all smaller and weaker than her) suggests a whole host of hypothetical realities without evidence, and then you go on to suggest something vague about trans people in general.

An uncharitable reading of your post is that rapists being put in with any prison population is worse than trans people being put in with their corresponding prison population. That's a wild claim and not at all reasonable. Trans people won't become trans to switch prisons.

I am actually curious though-- is there any evidence for your line of thinking? How many trans rapists are there? I've heard of one case, and I haven't heard any of the details (like it's super important to our discussion to know if the rapist continued raping people or if they became a model inmate). One case (or even a hundred) doesn't rise to the level of being able to generalize about trans people.

I also would like to know more about how inmates in various contexts perceive the option of becoming trans. Is it really as simple as wearing a wig?

Also, should we be incarcerating criminals based on their powerlifting totals (sum of bench press, squat, deadlift maximums) or based on reasoned analyses of their expected behavior? People raping each other in prisons is a solvable problem, and if any inmate thinks becoming trans confers an advantage, that's a solvable problem as well.

At best the rapist argument brings up a logistical issue for prison operators.

This claim (hypothetical male rapist becomes trans, is transferred to women's prison without care or thought, then commences raping other defenseless women inmates who are all smaller and weaker than her) suggests a whole host of hypothetical realities without evidence

Ah yes, very hypothetical. It has literally never happened.

and then you go on to suggest something vague about trans people in general.

Please substantiate your claim that I have suggested anything about trans people in general.

Trans people won't become trans to switch prisons.

What would you accept as evidence for this? It's not like I can see into the mind of the prisoners.

I also would like to know more about how inmates in various contexts perceive the option of becoming trans. Is it really as simple as wearing a wig?

Gender Self-ID laws are currently making their way through Europe. In fact, you might not even need the wig.

Also, should we be incarcerating criminals based on their powerlifting totals (sum of bench press, squat, deadlift maximums) or based on reasoned analyses of their expected behavior? People raping each other in prisons is a solvable problem, and if any inmate thinks becoming trans confers an advantage, that's a solvable problem as well.

We have never segregated prisons based on "gender", which is a novel concept, that a substantial portion of the population does not even believe in. They were always segregated based on sex, and I have not heard of a valid reason provided to change that.

At best the rapist argument brings up a logistical issue for prison operators.

Not really. We are yet to establish a valid reason for putting males in female prisons to begin with.

How is it a greater failure? Is it because you think rape is worse when trans people do it? If so, why is that?

I don't agree with the focus on trans prison rapists as a proxy for trans issues as a whole, but the idea is it's easily preventable. If someone climbs over the guardrails on a tall monument for a cool pic and falls to their death, that's bad - but less of a failure on the part of the monument than if there are no guardrails, just an open drop, and people are tripping off.

So, if you put someone who's raped women in a womens' prison, and then they rape women ... that's easier to prevent than 'prison rape generally'.

No, it's because I don't believe males belong in female prison, regardless of what crimes either of them commit. The fact that the crime is rape is just a cherry on top.

I don't believe males belong in female prison, regardless of what crimes either of them commit

This seems reasonable, but do you believe this because of some moral or religious principle? Why is that the criteria for which prison to put people in?

Like what if we could contrive a scenario where a prison operator puts their trans (MtF) women prisoners in female prisons and then some metrics that the prison operator cares about get better? Like total number of rapes goes down. Or violent assaults go down. Wouldn’t allowing that policy be better than clinging to the idea that prisons should be separated by gender/sex because [insert principle here, or just status quo?].

I’m not a prison expert, so I can’t say that this contrived example in any way reflects reality, but the point I’m trying to make is that the reflexive, intuitive “trans women shouldn’t go in men’s prisons” might not reflect the complexities of the real world (Like for example a more common issue is trans women who commit crimes {after becoming trans} and then are imprisoned. Where do they go? Prison operators don’t want them raped or assaulted (they’re on hormones, so physically weaker on average and may present as more feminine).

I’m not saying that the contrived scenario matches reality, but I am curious what your response is to that idea.

Didn't you criticize me for using an evidence-free hypothetical in order to make broader point in literally the neighboring comment, when I was neither making a hypothetical, nor making a broader point? What are you doing, man?

Like what if we could contrive a scenario where a prison operator puts their trans (MtF) women prisoners in female prisons and then some metrics that the prison operator cares about get better?

Sex segregation is based on a rough heuristic, not a specific scenario, so I don't care about those. If you could prove beyond reasonable doubt that your heuristic involving trans women is better for the prisoners / society / whatever, I'd be open to it.

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