A philosopher is apparently listed as the creator of part of a controversial report released May 1st by the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) regarding gender-affirming medical care for transgender youth.
Philosophers working for the government is a topic regularly covered here at Daily Nous. That’s one reason for this post, but not the only one.
The Department of Health and Human Services is led by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., known for his advocacy of positions widely rejected by the medical profession, scientists, and other experts. Kennedy was appointed by President Donald Trump, who, throughout his second term so far, has been attacking universities and cutting off the federal funding that supports much research in US institutions of higher education.
The anti-expertise and anti-education agenda of the Trump administration makes it surprising that any academic would agree to work for it.
Nonetheless, there seems to be some evidence that one academic—philosophy professor Alex Byrne of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, whose writing on transgender issues has been controversial—has done just that.
That evidence is in the metadata of the appendix of an HHS report, “Treatment for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria“. The appendix itself is titled “Overview of Systematic Reviews“.
The following is a screenshot I took of part of the metadata of the appendix, as viewable in a plain text-reader app like Notepad, which lists “Alex Byrne” as the creator of the appendix:
The text “<dc:creator>” is a tag that refers to “an entity primarily responsible for making the resource”. (The “dc” part is a reference to “Dublin Core“, a standard for metadata design.)
To my knowledge, the listing of Byrne’s name in the metadata was first pointed out by Florence Ashley, an assistant professor of law at the University of Alberta, in a post on Bluesky the day the report was released.
Whether the metadata is accurate and being interpreted correctly I can’t say for certain at this time.
The text of the report and appendix do not name any authors. According to a press release about the report from HHS, the authors “are not initially being made public, in order to help maintain the integrity” of the report’s “post-publication peer review”. This seems disingenuous, as it is unclear why the peer review of the report isn’t already as corrupted as it could be by its public presentation and endorsement by HHS and the presumption that the report was commissioned by Kennedy at Trump’s behest.
I wrote to Professor Byrne asking for confirmation (and description) of his involvement in the creation of the report’s appendix, but as of the the writing of this post, he has not replied. And so neither the nature and extent of his work on the report, nor the circumstances which led to it, are public knowledge.
The HHS says the report “highlights a growing body of evidence pointing to significant risks [of gender-affirming medical interventions]—including irreversible harms such as infertility—while finding very weak evidence of benefit. That weakness has been a consistent finding of systematic reviews of evidence around the world.”
Yet the report has come in for significant criticism.
The American Academy of Pediatrics, for example, published a response to the report, claiming it cherry-picks data and contains important errors:
For such an analysis to carry credibility, it must consider the totality of available data and the full spectrum of clinical outcomes rather than relying on select perspectives and a narrow set of data.
This report misrepresents the current medical consensus and fails to reflect the realities of pediatric care.
As we have seen with immunizations, bypassing medical expertise and scientific evidence has real consequences for the health of America’s children. AAP was not consulted in the development of this report, yet our policy and intentions behind our recommendations were cited throughout in inaccurate and misleading ways. The report prioritizes opinions over dispassionate reviews of evidence.
PBS Newshour says:
The report sharply contradicts guidance from the American Medical Association, which has urged states not to ban gender-affirming care for minors, saying that “empirical evidence has demonstrated that trans and non-binary gender identities are normal variations of human identity and expression.”
Science has an article about responses to the report here.
* * *
From day one of his second term, President Trump has taken aim at transgender women and men, attempting to deprive them of services, civil liberties, protections, and opportunities, and doing so with mockery and callousness. (Here and here are surveys of some of these efforts.) Of course, trans people are not Trump’s only targets. Immigrants, government employees, the disabled, and the domestic and global poor, among others, have been on the receiving end of his cruelty. Many more would be, were his selfish and authoritarian ambitions realized. It is not unreasonable for people to have differing views about gender identity. But it would be appalling were a philosophy professor to have voluntarily decided to help Trump with any of this. So I hope that things are not actually as they appear.
UPDATE 1: One of Byrne’s colleagues at MIT emailed him over the weekend, saying “I’m getting a LOT of email about the social media posts claiming you compiled the Appendices to the HHS report Treatment for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria. Among other things, people want to know if the claims are true. I don’t know what to say. Any guidance is appreciated.” Byrne replied, “Thanks. I have seen this floating around on social media. I’m afraid I can’t shed any light on this – I’m sorry!” When the colleague asked if they could share his response, Byrne wrote, “Sure (not at all helpful, admittedly).”
UPDATE 2: For clarification on “appalling” please see this comment.
UPDATE 3 (6/26/25): Byrne writes about his co-authoring of the report at The Washington Post. I respond to Byrne’s op-ed here.
Related: While Tables Burn: On the (Non)Existence of Trans People and the Failure of Philosophy
I would add that, even aside from the criticism from the American Academy of Pediatrics and others, the report (in the main body, not the appendix) shows internal signs of shoddy work. The first two citations listed in the bibliography are both dubious.* The first (a citation to an open letter criticizing the journal Archives of Sexual Behavior) is never cited in the body text, at least not under the name given in the bibliography. The second is a citation to a 404 message on WPATH’s website, meant to show that a certain statement was deleted; but that statement is still on the website and easily accessible from their “public statements” page, while the quote that is attributed to the statement never appeared in it (it was in a message that WPATH emailed to journalists, which appears never to have been on the website).
*Admittedly this is not a random sample; they’re the first two citations because they both begin with numbers, and I looked at them because it’s weird to have a citation that begins with a number.
It is worth noting, I think, that American medical organizations such as the AAP are, on this issue, quite out of step with medical opinion in much of western Europe (see Sweden’s recent policy change) and the UK (see the Cass report and associated policy changes). What to make of this variation is open to debate but the post misrepresents the state of medical opinion on the issues.
While I agree that the state of medical opinion is far from clear on this issue, I don’t see how the post misrepresents it. The quotations above, from the AAP and others, *do* suggest a medical consensus, which might be contentious. But Justin merely quotes these as “significant criticisms” of the HHS report, and quotation is obviously not endorsement.
Thanks, Meme.
Perhaps “misrepresents” is too strong. I guess I think the post doesn’t do anything close to justice to the views of worldwide medical opinion and is thereby very likely to mislead the typical reader. The post does quote the HHS report asserting evidence of harm and very weak evidence of benefit (as per systematic reviews “around the world.”). Justin follows that short quotation with a series of criticisms from US-based medical and scientific organizations, without any further consideration of the views of medical professionals in other countries we’d normally think reliable.
On another issue: Justin asserts that “It is not unreasonable for people to have differing views about gender identity. But it would be appalling were a philosophy professor to have voluntarily decided to help Trump with any of this.” I don’t know if Byrne is in fact involved in this report, but it isn’t obvious to me that participating in or endorsing one aspect of Trump’s policies is appalling. I find Trump utterly repellent and dangerous in many many ways. Nonetheless, I endorse his occasional attempts (doubtless ill-motivated) to find ways to end (Russia-Ukraine) or avoid (Iran) wars.
Thanks for the reply, that’s all fair. I also agree that the “appalling” claim seems too strong.
His “attempts” to end a war through capitulation are equally disgusting, and it’s disingenuous for you to claim to both find him repellant and dangerous, yet to be entirely blind to that most pressing danger.
The Cass report was blatantly politicized and the double standards in the Swedish report were glaringly evident (compare its citation of anecdotal evidence for the alleged downsides of trans care with its demand for randomized control trials for the upsides).
And in general, it seems like a category mistake to compare government-sponsored reviews (like the Cass Review, the report from Sweden’s National Board of Health and Welfare, and the HHS report under discussion) with the statements made by medical organizations (such as WPATH, the AAP, the French Society of Pediatric Endocrinology and Diabetology and the Association of the Scientific Medical Societies in Germany, Switzerland and Austria). One is obviously subject to politicization, the other is directed at capturing the views of subject matter experts. Though I wouldn’t take that to be dispositive if the first group hadn’t shown itself to be flawed in other ways.
Don’t know about the Swedish report but the idea that the Cass report was ‘blatantly politicised’ is absurd. It has been widely accepted amongst health organisations in the UK (the exception being the BMA). Hilary Cass has had a distinguished career as a paediatrician, the idea that she suddenly decided to start picking on one particular group of young people when she started working on the report is, again, absurd.
I suggest you read the report if you haven’t already. If you have, it would be very interesting to know which parts specifically of it you think are politicised.
I’ve read the report. A lot of its recommendations are uncontroversial, but its justifications for its more controversial recommendations are obviously weak, and at certain points comically so. I recommend reading the report and critiques of it for perspective. Is it politicized? Idk, but it is quite obviously biased.
Which critique do you find most credible & persuasive? (Not asking you to rehearse or summarize the argument; just title or link)
This one from Yale Law is pretty complete: https://law.yale.edu/sites/default/files/documents/integrity-project_cass-response.pdf
It’s quite a bit shorter than the Cass Review itself because it tears up the roots on multiple points. Prominent is the Review’s criteria around research to consider omitting as biased everything from WPATH or many other orgs entering into their studies without complete lack of treatment being on the table, which is not at all a standard requirement in medical research, as well as only considering research in English when a great deal comes out of the Netherlands.
Most simply though, the review considers in depth the effectiveness of puberty blockers as treatment for depression, when listening to anyone actually experienced in the area would inform them that that is not their purpose. They are instead a *preventative* treatment for body changes which pretty universally cause depression in trans people. If a slowly spreading rash causes depression and a medication stops growth but does not treat existing patches, how do you assess its effectiveness? Kids starting puberty blockers before puberty has started not having depression from gender dysphoria lessened is treated as a point against the blockers even if it’s quite expected with a preventative.
Thanks for replying. This is actually the only one I have read all of, along with some criticisms. I don’t pretend to understand all of it. At some points I’m a little out of my depth. But mostly I follow.
The part of the McNamara etc paper that sums up a point you mentioned says:
“The Review’s implication that puberty-pausing medication should lead to a reduction in current gender dysphoria or improve one’s current body satisfaction indicates ignorance or misunderstanding at best, and intentional deception about the basic function of these medications at worst.”
Cass defenders however have pointed out that this doesn’t line up with what many advocates of pediatric gender affirming care have said, including one of the Yale paper co-authors. Johanna Olson-Kennedy’s research protocol for one of her studies hypothesizes reduction (not just prevention) of symptoms:
“A research protocol for
10.1.2 Study Hypotheses
Effects of Hormonal Interventions on Mental Health and Psychological Well-Being:
• Hypothesis 1a: Patients treated with GnRH agonists will exhibit decreased symptoms of gender
dysphoria, depression, anxiety, trauma symptoms, self-injury, and suicidality and increased body
esteem and quality of life over time
• Hypothesis 2a: Patients treated with cross-sex hormones will exhibit decreased symptoms of anxiety and depression, gender dysphoria, self-injury, trauma symptoms, and suicidality and increase body esteem and quality of life over time”
See p. 34 of this pdf
https://www.nejm.org/doi/suppl/10.1056/NEJMoa2206297/suppl_file/nejmoa2206297_protocol.pdf
Maybe there’s an explanation for this. But on the surface, it doesn’t look good. It’s possible Olson-Kennedy or someone from McNamara team responded to this and I’ve missed it?)
IIRC a couple of other objections/responses follow a similar pattern. McNamara criticizes Cass in very strong terms for some language or assumption that purportedly raises doubts about the credibility of the review and the people involved. Cass defenders respond with receipts showing that some on the pro-gender affirming care side, sometimes even one of the co-authors, has apparently made the same assumption or used the same language.
One was over whether describing the increase in gender dysphoric youth as ‘exponential’ suggests a polemical rather than scientific approach. Cass defenders say that WPATH has used the same language. (They also argue that the data support use of the term ‘exponential’)
Anyway, for those interested in following the debate, these from the pro-Cass side are worth knowing about out. More for the substantive, text-based points than for critiques about the motive for the Yale paper.
https://adc.bmj.com/content/110/4/251
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0092623X.2025.2455133#d1e145
(decided not to comment)
The medical opinion in “much of Western Europe” has been cherry-picked in the UK media, and the right wing US media.
Germany, Austria and Switzerland released updated guidelines earlier this year that contradict the UK direction. France, Spain and Finland are on a similar path.
This observation would be much more “worth noting” here were this report a move in a game in which participants were earnestly trying to determine the best medical practices to best further the welfare of the population under study. HHS no longer plays that game.
So this is only two countries. Other countries in Western Europe have gone against the Cass Report and other anti-trans sentiment, including Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
Also, most of our own medical bodies and medical trade unions have contradicted the direction the UK is heading in with regards to trans medicine and politics (the most overt being the British Medical Association who have rejected the Cass Review and the associated policy changes). The objections our country have are entirely political and not in step with what our actual doctors, scientists and experts are recommending
This is false. The BMA has shifted to a “neutral” position on the Cass Review and was heavily criticized for its initial rejection of the review.
Germany, Austria, and Switzerland are in the top 10 healthiest countries in Europe. I believe them.
Germany sells cigarettes from vending machines on the street
https://segm.org/German-guidelines-gender-dysphoria-youth-2025
This post will have a lot of people weighing up the quality of this report on its own merits, but I also think it’s reasonable to question the judgment of anyone who would put together this report for this Department of Health and Human Services. The secretary of this HHS has promised to find the cause of autism by the end of this year, and to remove the environmental contaminants responsible for causing autism. This HHS does not intend to practice science and is quite open about this, so if you are a philosopher who thinks scientific institutions have suffered from a sort of ideological capture, the last thing you should do is expend intellectual effort on behalf of a scientific institution that has been captured by conspiracy theorists who are in the process of scrapping all of its scientific infrastructure. Yet that seems to be what happened here.
It is also, of course, clear to anyone willing to pay attention that the current administration is hostile to transgender people and intends to immiserate and humiliate them for political gain. It’s reasonable to question the judgment of anyone who would put together this report for this administration, when everyone knows the political project it serves.
Some might think I’m committing the fallacy of guilt by association. I think I’m giving a clear-eyed assessment of cause and effect.
I don’t believe this is correct. There are many ongoing projects at agencies such as the NIH which reports to the DHHS, but doesn’t mean every one of those NIH sponsored projects has been corrupted. I’d need to know more about when this report was written, when it was commissioned, and who did any kind of formal sign-off before I agreed with this assertion.
I speak as someone who is currently on DSMBs for several NIH sponsored projects, projects that were started well before this year. We are independent. And the minute we are asked to compromise that independence my fellow committee members and I will quit. Full stop.
Considering the report was requested on January 28, 2025, by an executive order titled “Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation”, and exists in the context of several years of “freak-of-the-week” conservative news scapegoating, hundreds of republican legislative efforts targeting trans people, including a Florida Medical Report on Transgender Care that was cited to ban medicare coverage and trans youth medicine, where a leaked document showed direct evidence that the report was requested and made as part of a roadmap effort to ban trans medical care, a roadmap that has been shared pretty publicly to anyone who has paid even the slightest attention – the political intention corrupting the project should be pretty clear.
https:// transgender. agency/dvw/DOC%20182-36%20PL%20296. pdf
But maybe it was already being worked on before the order was signed by the Heritage Foundation, like much of the rest of Project 2025, considering that requesting this report was also explicitly indicated in that project.
Also this whole field of “medical research” is already heavily politicized to anyone familiar. Surely you can imagine how easily bias can be placed into a review like this, while remaining ostensibly authoritative and considered.
Another witch hunt? From metadata? Really? If anybody else here is tired of this, here is an invitation to dismantle — not further soundproof — echo chambers: https://philarchive.org/archive/CHAOAS
It would probably lead to more intelligent discussion if people avoided using phrases like “witch hunt” to refer to criticism of someone’s political activity.
A guy whose main activity is to shill always and only his own stuff here is wagging his finger at us about echo chambers? Say what you will about an echo chamber even that’s better than just standing there and telling the guy in the mirror how brilliant he is.
No simple video clip this time?
Please don’t encourage him.
One relevant disanalogy between accusing people of transphobia, attacking children to score political points, or collaborating with abusive authoritarian governments (on the one hand) and witch hunts (on the other) is that there aren’t any witches.
This report is part of a genocidal project against trans people, including our amazing trans colleagues. Now is a good time to check in on people targeted by this report (including parents of trans kids) and express your support. Don’t forget about the APA fund for LGBTQ+ philosophy, the ACLU, the Trans Youth Emergency Project, and other orgs providing material aid.
Did you read the report? I can’t see how it targets anyone, nor can I see how it promotes genocide.
Did you read the report? I can’t see how it can be understood as anything other than aiming to harm trans people with the veneer of scientific backing.
(An equally contentless comment as your own. Yes, people have read it. And just because you fail to understand something doesn’t mean it isn’t true.)
“Genocidal project.” This trend of making transparently false claims (and others tolerating or even “thumbs-upping” them) so long as they’re on behalf of the “correct” side or group is embarrassing.
Compare: “The Civil Rights Act is a genocidal project against racists!”
Obvious Response: No. It says it’s illegal to racially discriminate against people in specific domains of public life (e.g., hiring, admissions). You’re legally allowed to be racist. And obviously they’re not proposing to kill anyone for being racist. They’re just not legally permitting people to express their racism in some contexts. That’s not (even close to) genocide.
“The Trump admin is on a genocidal project against trans people!”
Obvious Response: No. They’re saying they’re not going to legally recognize trans people as the sex/gender of their choice, identity, or preference. And they’re not going to legally permit minors to have gender-affirming surgery. You’re legally allowed to be trans. And obviously they’re not proposing to kill anyone for being trans. They’re just not going to legally recognize it or let minors get surgery. That may be objectionable, but it’s not (even close to) genocide.
Are you comparing a group judged for an innate quality of themselves (trans people) to a group that chooses to prejudice others based on another innate quality (racists to people of other races) ?
It is apples to oranges. Racism is hate, and hate should be wiped out, either the hateful attitude or the hateful person being ostracized. Would you say the same thing about trans people?
I’m drawing an analogy between what we all recognize as a comically easy case (Does legally banning some expressions of racism constitute genocide against racists?) and an apparently difficult (for some people) case (Does legally banning some expressions of trans identity constitute genocide against trans people?)
The answer to the first question is an easy “No,” and since all genocide-relevant features are the same in the second case, that one should also be an easy “No.” Yet philosophers routinely goof it up.
Nothing about the analogy requires thinking racism is good, trans people are bad, or that the two groups are morally on a par. Pay attention to what I’m claiming are the relevant similarities.
This is just such bad argument, on both legal and philosophical grounds.
You seem unaware of the definition of genocide. You seem to think it only means ‘killing people.’ Let’s review why this might fall within the category of genocide (perhaps you need to look at the legal definition of genocide before commenting again, I will point out. Refer to the UN definition.).
“Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;”
Not recognising a trans person as being their acquired gender, forcing them to navigate the world in a way incompatible with their identity, and so on, we know causes mental harm; or, at least, we have good evidence to think is the case.
Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;As above, the same issues exist here.
It’s not a difficult argument to say that intentionally not recognising trans persons as their gender, forcing them to navigate the legal bureaucracy of the world, forcing them to live their lives in just such a way that they are at odds with their own government-issued ID, and so on, is an attempt to extinguish them. It does seem that this would cause serious mental harm and likely increase the probability of members of that community suffering long-term negative consequences, and potentially raise the risk of suicide. That would then, potentially, satisfy the mens rea (mental element) of the offence of genocide.
You then make a bad analogy: does expression of a particular belief (racism) deny that person the expression of their very identify in the way that denying a trans person legitimate recognition does? Absolutely not. It’s not even a close call. We do not treat gender and its expression in the way that we treat free expression of an ideal, even if that ideal is genuinely and sincerely held and important to the person. Nor we do seem to think that they are the same kind of thing.
Even if we think that there is not sufficient evidence to support the idea that forcing people to live in a legal bureaucracy incompatible with their self-identity (which, I suspect is not the case, given how many harm we know results from just that — and we know that, e.g., it would be incompatible with European Human Rights law), you’ve presented this argument as if it’s just incredibly obvious and clear-cut.
Yet, you’ve seemingly simultaneously demonstrated that you’re unfamiliar with the actual definition of genocide.
You have quoted out of context Article II of Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide. The full definition (with your quotation bolded) reads:
So no the UN does not hold to your remarkably broad definition of genocide. Causing serious mental harm to members of a group is not genocide unless it is intended to destroy in whole or in part said group.
Ironically, the UN hasn’t even considered gender identity as a possible category for genocide (not to say that such a thing is inconceivable, only that by appealing to the UN’s definition you’ve cut the branch out from under you).
You are unfamiliar with the actual definition of genocide.
Sorry, this reply holds no water.
Of course I know that the intent you point to is necessary. Try reading what I said again, and note that I specifically pointed to a mental element.
Note that I also pointed to the very language of destroy in whole or part.
Whilst you’re correct on the UN not counting gender, the rest of your reply deals with this point.
Now, instead of some poor ‘aha, gotcha!’ Try again, but this time with the substance of the argument.
You’re also acting in bad-faith in assuming that my argument is misconstruing or misrepresenting the definition of genocide merely because I did not quote the article in full (even though I did say you should read it; and even though I explicitly mentioned the necessary mental element!). Nowhere do I define genocide as the mere ‘Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group’
Now, re-read the argument, without such a gross distortion of the argument. And engage with substance, instead of very poor ‘aha!’
Given the heavy use of ChatGPT by this admin on a variety of issues, I’d wonder if someone just plucked Byrne out of a LLM for some citation stuff and then stuffed him in. That someone in the admin would have the time or wherewithal to ask Byrne for advice strikes me as too reasonable and rational already.
The lack of charity in this post is what’s really appalling.
Don’t forget that Byrne is an immigrant to the United States. Clearly the most charitable interpretation is that Trump or one of his henchmen used ICE to threaten Byrne with deportation unless he agreed to write the report for HHS, thereby providing a veneer of respectability for Trump’s opportunistic war on trans people. Byrne’s a professor at one of the most prestigious universities in the world. He’s got a lot to lose, unlike that student Mohsen Mahdawi who said he wasn’t afraid of Trump. Basically, Byrne had no choice!
Either that or he was offered a lot of money. I would venture the latter. What I find truly hilarious and yet sad is the insistence on treating this man like a victim. He is not a victim. He has made a name for himself precisely by attempting to make trans lives unliveable. He is philosopher who has clearly collaborated with a fascist regime – one that has made explicit its aim to eliminate trans people.
What evidence is there that he has attempted to “make trans lives unlivable”? Having orthodox views on the nature of women and doubts about the wisdom of “gender affirming” care for minors and defending them surely isn’t enough.
Try to view things – if you can – from the perspective from a trans person. My evidence is his book Trouble with Gender, as well as his alliance with philosophers like Holly Lawford-Smith. My views are also grounded in a lifetime of experience in dealing with scholars of his sort. There is typically an attempt to present such views as merely inquiries. But, these views are then deployed in ways to make trans lives difficult (at first) and then unliveable. Take his view on the question whether trans women are women. Obviously, that can have policy consequences for trans women regardless of what his own views are on that and regardless of what company he keeps (HLS) and regardless of what projects he helps contribute to (Trump’s trans eradication project or a portion thereof). One must really train oneself to read the full context of the situation. I have had to learn how to do that over time.
Do I think it is his main aim to make trans lives unliveable? Who knows? What matters to trans people, however, are the consequences.
But you said he is “attempting” to make trans lives unlivable and that he “clearly collaborated” with a hostile regime. I agree the consequences of his arguments are far more important than his aims — and that those consequences are monstrous. There’s a real danger they’ll make “trans lives unlivable.” And that raises a moral challenge to such putative “inquiries.”
But if you take the additional step of making it personal, of explicitly vilifying his motives and character, and that of HLS, you invite precisely the shift away from the consequences you claim are all that matters. You invite scrutiny about what evidence you have that these “sociopathic” individuals (your word) have the aim of harming trans people.
I agree with all you say about the harm these arguments cause. No need to go beyond that by seeking to inflict some on the other side.
I don’t see any reason to suspect that either threats or bribes were involved. If someone from a national government asked me to write (for free) an appendix about conditional probability on events of measure 0, I’d probably do it even if it was a government I hated (though I would try to think carefully about whether this was somehow tying into a political program I didn’t support).
I think that for most academics, if someone asks us to write up something about a topic we care about, we would be willing to do it without any threats or bribes, so there’s no need to speculate that those were involved here.
I like trying to imagine what purposes a government might have in commissioning an appendix on conditional probability on events of measure 0.
They’re interested in how to plan for situations in which the Trump administration improves the nation.
And of course it’s utter depravity of the woke types that forced him to keep this secret. We all know how brave our self-proclaimed “Free Speech Heroes and Martyrs” are (how could we not given how often they tell us about said bravery?), but there are limits even to their courage. The Trump regime can put you in concentration camp in El Salvador sure but of course that’s nothing compared to the inhuman torture of having to publish your book with a slightly less prestigious press than you’re accustomed to. Now thanks to Justin that poor poor man will probably have to publish his next book with Regnery or Intervarsity Press
Irony aside, it says so much about this whole crowd that it took me until the last two sentences to be sure that you were being ironic.
There’s a lot built into the quote’s framing. A major difference between the first and second Trump administrations has been the significant presence in the first administration, and the present lack thereof, of non-loyalists (or even loyalists with apparent limits, such as Pence). It is far from obvious to me that condemning participation in executive branch activities is the best approach. Its success would result in a government consisting only of participants who are sufficiently ensconced in MAGA to be immune from such pressures. It wouldn’t be pushing people out of a campaign, but out of the government. “Personnel is policy.” The Heritage Foundation put a lot of work into trying to get this result. The person who most wants those who might oppose something Trump does to self-select out of participating in executive branch activities is Trump.
Are you suggesting that the person who compiled this report or the appendix to this report did so in an effort to reign in RFK Jr. and/or the the Trump admin? if so, what are you talking about? If not, what are you talking about?
I am not suggesting this. My comment regards effects. It seems like you want to talk about motivations.
What part is unclear? (or are you just being hostile)
The post is disapproving of someone for helping with this particular document. You are proposing that disapproval of assisting the administration has some sort of deterring effect on other(?) people who might choose to work within this administration to restrain it from its excesses (seemingly an unrelated case from this one, entirely). That is a confusing stance to take, because it suggests a general prohibition on criticizing people for collaboration that aids the nefarious ends of this administration. If you can explain what you had in mind where it doesn’t suggest that we should be treating supportive collaboration with kid gloves, you can elaborate, but I think it is fair to say that your original post was not clear on the point.
Lewis,
Fair enough.
I would modify:
(a) “who might choose to work within this administration *to* restrain it from its excesses”
to
(b) who might choose to work within this administration and *would* restrain it from its excesses
“To” implies that restraining the administration’s excesses is their motivation for working within the administration. I’m just talking about effects. I wouldn’t be surprised if among the people who *did* restrain Trump in his first administration, few joined the administration with that motivation. Along with this modification, I would make some others, though the following might cut to the chase.
I wouldn’t go that far. I said, “It is far from obvious to me that condemning participation in executive branch activities is the best approach.” I think I pointed out a substantial cost of this approach, but it would surely be overridden in some cases.
I agree that it is far from obvious that a blanket condemnation of participation in executive branch activities is the best approach.
That said, it is worth looking at the substance of the participation, and whether that substance tends to moderate or intensify the problems.
When the smelling salts kick in, I hope you’ll read this and agree that part of growing up is realizing the truth of the old saying that politics makes strange bedfellows. Whichever way you go on this issue, you’ll find yourself allied either with homophobic conversion therapists, transhumanists, Big Pharma, and the like, or with religious conservatives, radical feminists, crunchy old-school hippies, and, yes, Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Pick your poison. And maybe we can all agree that, if some philosopher helped compile studies in support of the Soviet Union’s early ban on lobotomies, well before that was popular, then he ought to be supported, even in the face of posturing anti-Soviets of the time, wheezing their spleen from their fainting couches, feigning outrage that anyone would ever so much as lift a finger in support of “the Evil Empire.”
Let’s disambiguate. If “allied” means “holds overlapping views with” then sure, it is almost certain that one will find oneself “allied” with all sorts of folks one considers unpalatable in some aspect or another, no matter what one’s views. But if “allied” means “working for” or “working together with” then being allied in this way is far from inevitable. Sure, there may be instances in which it makes sense to consider working with people who have various commitments you might reject. When faced with such opportunities one needs to assess the benefits and costs of doing so and make a decision. And then one is responsible for that decision, in a way that one is not responsible for the inevitable. The sense of “allied” relevant to this post is the latter one. Let’s not paper over that with ambiguities.
Your terms are acceptable to me, Justin, especially this part: “Sure, there may be instances in which it makes sense to consider working with people who have various commitments you might reject.” Thanks for your thoughtful reply.
Very well said
There’s a difference between happening to share someone’s view and contributing to their propaganda. The difference is even more stark when this someone is wielding state power against political opponents, habeas corpus, due process, and the rule of law. This is actually a good distinction to pick up along the way to adulthood–probably earlier. Just because you like the same music as that group of kids, doesn’t mean you need to join their gang.
In your example, if using his work to support Stalinist propaganda was optional–if he could have published it in neutral venues but volunteered to support Stalin–then this scientist would be acting wrongly and one could sincerely oppose his Stalinist activism, as opposed to merely feigning it.
These excuses for Byrne’s behavior are funny. And desperate. Look. We have Byrne collaborating with a fascist regime to help it with its anti-trans agenda. We can do all of the mental gymnastics that we want. But, when Elon did a Nazi salute (twice), I refused to be gaslit. And the alignment between anti-trans philosophers and the alt-right is as plain as day. Of course, I was trying to make this point in my essay “While Tables Burn.” Byrne’s behavior just seems to take it over the top.
“politics makes strange bedfellows” is a much better bit of sophistry than “just following orders”, at least
“And maybe we can all agree that, if some philosopher helped compile studies in support of the Soviet Union’s early ban on lobotomies, well before that was popular, then he ought to be supported”
Not if that philosopher had any way of anticipating that such collaborations would help bring about the treatment of mentally ill people that actually occurred in the Soviet era to which (I think) you’re referring.
How on earth do you find yourself allied (in either sense of the term) with ‘homophobic conversion therapists’ if one supports trans people? I’ve never met a homophobic person who wasn’t also transphobic.
If one is committed to the traditional gender binary and opposed to homosexuality, one might see transitioning as a “cure” for the latter (e.g., a trans woman, who is attracted to men, might surgically transition so as to avoid the charge of homosexuality). This sort of reasoning occurs in Iran, for example: http://www.us-iran.org/resources/2021/7/15/homosexuality-gender-assignment-in-iran.
Suffice it to say that I am only reporting the reasoning, without endorsement.
I find it tiresome how few of you personally know any trans people, let alone how apathetic you are towards making any real effort empathizing with us. Your comparison, and this whole conversation on medical transition collectively sees it, maybe pretends to see it, as premised on its face justification: something done onto us or something we choose to “alleviate” our gender dysphoria pathology. A frame that only even exists out of protective necessity as an evolution of previously essentially pathologizing GID – which itself also exists in the context of other historical forms of pathologizing queer identity.
Yes, we persistently exist through a medical context because we have to in order to have access to HRT and surgery, but this is a fundamentally normative conversation about whether the harm done onto trans people (which really, lets be honest at this point, are basically just all the persistently gender non-conforming youth) when they cannot change themselves physically and exist in a gendered society as they would like to, is worth enough to the rest of society to allow for accommodation. For trans youth, its about whether or not young people deserve to have the autonomy and accommodation in making these decisions about their bodies before the effects of puberty rob them of the choice.
And either you really cant conceive of what is past the “medical” frame, and choose to engage with it knowing really nothing about our experience, which speaks to how little you think of us, or you pretend to take it at face because you have already made an allegiance on the issue.
Keep telling yourselves that this is lobotomies and that you aren’t just giving permission and support for a reactionary crackdown.
Snoweep, thank you for pointing these things out. It is painful and frightening to see how much harm is being caused, while the same crude and cruel conversation is to be expected from colleagues, all of whom know better.
To be clear, when you name “radical feminists” here, what you mean is roughly, “those who have dedicated themselves to the enforcement of impermeable, binary gender”? Because those people have long claimed the label, but radical feminists who write about things other than the ontological evil of transgender people, including no less than Andrea Dworkin (please do read Woman Hating), have long recognized transgender people as an oppressed, rather than oppressing, class.
“No matter what you do, you’ll inevitably end up allied with genocidal fascists” sure is an interesting and completely bias-free stance to take here.
There are some points in history when there have been enough genocidal fascists who operated in different enough directions that the statement might have been true.
While there are currently more genocidal fascists operating than there were a decade or two ago, and thus more different political causes one might endorse that might be allied with one or another of these fascists, I don’t think we’re currently in the situation where every political cause has some genocidal fascists on board with it.
“No matter what you do, you’ll inevitably end up allied with genocidal fascists”
There are quotation marks around this, but Nobody seems to be quoting nobody. Certainly not me.
I don’t see what’s appalling with a philosophy professor volunteering to help with a systematic review that comes to roughly the same conclusions most other systematic reviews on pediatric gender medicine have come to.
Setting aside likely disagreements about either the criteria of application or the present application of “systematic,” this description is awfully short on context – most notably the institution commissioning the review and their easily predictable use of it. There’s nothing wrong per se with doing a bit of nuclear physics, for instance, but it matters quite a bit for whom you’re doing it and what they’re likely to do with your work.
This post is inappropriate. If you don’t know “whether the metadata is accurate and being interpreted appropriately,” and if you don’t know what Byrne (allegedly) contributed to the report, and if you don’t know what he intended to accomplish by making this contribution, then you shouldn’t publish a hit-piece about him on the profession’s most popular blog.
Moreover: If Byrne did help write the report, he had (and, for all we know, acted on) a legitimate reason: to try to ensure that the contents of the report were true (or that they were more approximately true than they otherwise would have been). On what grounds are we entitled to assume that this wasn’t Byrne’s motive?
Relatedly: it’s not at all clear that, by making a contribution to a report commissioned by a secretary appointed by a demagogue, one thereby participates in said demagogue’s demagoguery. In fact, there’s not even a prima facie case for wrongdoing here. It all (and I really mean all) depends on what exactly Byrne contributed and why exactly he contributed it. And we are presently mostly in the dark about that.
Finally: it’s ironic that you criticize the Trump administration for being anti-expertise but then chastise the first expert you find who (apparently, allegedly) tried to give the administration some input.
The Trump administration is anti-expertise. So, experts should actively look for opportunities to influence its policies (because those policies won’t be subject to expert feedback otherwise). We should all be more like Byrne in this respect, not less.
P.S. I read the executive summary of the HHS report and skimmed the appendix (allegedly, partly) authored by Byrne. Neither reads like anti-trans propaganda (somewhat to my surprise, in the case of the executive summary). I’m no scientist, but the methodology described in the appendix seems perfectly reasonable to me. If it weren’t allegedly authored by Byrne and about a politically sensitive issue, I doubt anyone would bat an eye.
this.
wait, don’t you run a whole website for people to anonymously post unverified, anti-trans claims?
I love to see these comments on Daily Nous. They really speak to the sad state of affairs of the profession. I mean, seriously. The degree to which philosophers will go to defend collaboration with a fascist regime in its efforts to eliminate a group of people is breathtaking.
Assuming Byrne helped on the HHS report, how is that helping eliminate any group of people?
Trump’s regime has made it clear that they aim to eliminate trans people. So, you need to place this report and the Executive Order it is associated with (Protecting Children from “Surgical and Chemical Mutilation”) within that context.
“Trump’s regime has made it clear that they aim to eliminate trans people.”
Citation, please?
You don’t read the news? Wild. You should check out some of the executive orders your boy Trump is throwing out there. They are pretty wild. You probably want to learn a bit about what he’s up to before you get into these discussions, buddy.
You’re right, Tom.
I can’t find a definitive quote from the WH.
I was thinking of Michael Knowles from the Daily Wire, merely one of many speakers at 2023 CPAC https://www.hrc.org/press-releases/human-rights-campaign-extremists-at-cpac-laid-bare-hatred-at-root-of-vile-legislation-targeting-trans-people
And I was also thinking of these Republicans from Michigan and Ohio (admittedly not from the Trump administration).
https://www.erininthemorning.com/p/ohio-michigan-republicans-in-released
In this case, you might argue that banning gender-affirming care for adults is not the same thing as eliminating trans people. But once you have gotten rid of access to appropriate ID, sex-segregated spaces, gender-affirming care, and so forth, you have pretty much gotten rid of us from public life.
I was also thinking of this ad from Trump’s campaign which get’s very close to promising a ban on gender affirming care for adults. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rENURoBPJo
See also https://www.erininthemorning.com/p/the-trump-administration-threat-to
And never mind the EOs themselves which falsely conflate trans people with “radical gender ideology” (something that was apparently invented by the left only a few years ago). The goal of course is to eliminate that ideology. So, of course, you get the idea.
Thank you for your reply, Talia. I had asked for evidence in support of your claim that “Trump’s regime has made it clear that they aim to eliminate trans people.”
In reply, you said, “You’re right, Tom. I can’t find a definitive quote from the WH.” OK, that’s good to know. Thank you. (Also, no big deal, but nobody really calls me ‘Tom’. Well, one friend does, a retired police officer and kind of a good-ol’-boy type, so I go with it haha.)
You went on to say, “I was thinking of Michael Knowles from the Daily Wire, merely one of many speakers at 2023 CPAC.”
Yes, I am a little familiar with Knowles’ claim that transgender-ISM must be eradicated. In response to his critics saying that he called for the eradication of trans PEOPLE, he insisted that’s a libelous misrepresentation. He says he wishes to eradicate the ideology, the -ism, not the people. See, for example, here: https://www.dailydot.com/debug/michael-knowles-cpac-trans-rights/
You also provided evidence of some Republican lawmakers who wish to ban so-called “gender-affirming care for adults,” and an ad from the Trump campaign which gets “very close” to promising as much. You admit this “is not the same thing as eliminating trans people.” OK, that too is good to know. Thank you for your honest and thoughtful response.
You go on to say that, nevertheless, “once you have gotten rid of access to appropriate ID, sex-segregated spaces, gender-affirming care, and so forth, you have pretty much gotten rid of us from public life.”
I can’t see how this is so. I’ll set aside quibbles over what counts as “appropriate ID” (since I suspect we disagree on whether IDs should reflect biological reality or not), but even if you’re right about this worst-case scenario and trans-identifying individuals were removed “from public life,” that would not amount to eliminating trans people, would it? I mean, only in a vitiated, motte-in-a-motte-and-bailey sort of way. No bloodshed, for example; certainly no genocide. Merely no formal recognition of trans-identification in the law. In that way, trans-identification would be like very many other human characteristics, I’d think.
Anyway, thanks again for your response. Take care.
I guess not being able to use a bathroom in public or have ID that would let you travel within or between countries without getting hassled by LEO is “merely no formal recognition of trans-identification in the law” if you are being willfully obtuse about what Talia Mae Bettcher wrote and obscenely credulous about Knowles’s claims.
I personally think Bogardus is too informed and intelligent to misunderstand Knowles and Bettcher to the degree required for this last comment to be meant in earnest.
What other human characteristics are you thinking of, which would (in a world where all of these policies are made law and enforced) be not only disregarded by legal authorities, but also lead people to be fired from their jobs, disallowed from using any public single-sex restrooms, and disallowed from serving in the military (to name just a few of the desired outcomes of these policies)? I don’t think having blond hair, or being left-handed, or being Buddhist, or liking Pearl Jam, are similar in any way to the desired outcomes of “trans-identification” under such policies.
How about being opposed to DEI in academia or journalism?
Would you prefer Thomas? I will defer to your preferences. One of the things you leave out about Knowles is that he also denies that trans constitutes a “real ontological category” or a “legitimate category of being.” One way of taking this is the following. There are no such beings as trans people. There is only “gender ideology” and those who are duped by it. In such a view, gender dysphoria does not exist. In such a view there are no trans women and trans men (by ‘trans women’ and ‘trans men’ I am leaving it open whether trans women are women and trans men are men). In such a view, to eliminate gender ideology is ipso facto to eliminate transness. On this point, it is worth noting that the wording in the WH EOs suggest precisely this. (I won’t go into an analysis now but will provide one if you would like).
On the question of elimination, I suspect that in the end our conversation will break down and we will be left speaking different languages. But the situation I am imagining is this: Trans people are no longer allowed to have legal ID that reflect their gender identity (and let’s include names), trans people are no longer allowed to access the intimate spaces that reflect their gender identity, and trans people are no longer allowed to access gender affirming care at all. Now, you deny that this amounts to the elimination of trans people because trans people would still be alive? This is where our conversation breaks down. Yes, trans people still exist. But they cannot live meaningful, fulfilled lives as trans people. So they might exist in the way that a goat exists. But they are not capable of a human life as a trans person. And that is the issue. Of course, we can debate the semantics of “elimination.” But that to me is beside the point, for I have made plain my own sense. At any rate, let me conclude with a metaphor: Suppose we take a caterpillar and prevent that caterpillar from becoming a butterfly. To my mind, the butterfly does not exist just because the caterpillar does. But, as I said, I suspect that we just don’t see eye to eye on this point.
I’m very sympathetic to this argument. It makes sense to me that eliminating conditions of transness–and/or preventing human beings from realizing their trans identity–is in a real sense eliminating trans people. Certainly, it’s eliminating the ability of some human beings to flourish in the way that’s best for them.
At the same time, I’d like to hear your thoughts about one concern (not an academic concern, but a practical one). My experience is that many people hear the phrase “eliminating trans people” as “killing or removing from society people who identify as trans.” Comments about genocide also suggest this reading. Is it the reading you intend?
Maybe it is. And if that reading is true, and there really is a governmental effort to kill/remove people who identify as trans, then that would obviously be horrific beyond measure. But that reading, as far as I can sincerely tell, doesn’t seem true. So, my concern in this case is that claims of “eliminating trans people” will come across as exaggerations. That’s worrisome to me because it seems like it would detract from the very legitimate concerns of trans people. Society might conclude that they’re simply “crying wolf”–and if about “elimination,” then why not about other things?
On the other hand, maybe you don’t intend the more extreme reading. In that case, why speak in a way that invites confusion–especially when that confusion might end up harming the cause of trans rights?
To be clear, again, I’m asking this sincerely (rather than as a “gotcha”) and practically (academics aside, these questions seem important for the cause). Thanks.
I guess this is in part a reply to the whole debate about genocide that has already occurred in this discussion (above). Of course, one can cite the UN or the dictionary for a definition of ‘genocide.’ But as philosophers, we do press more deeply (we hope!). And of course, there is a complex literature on the question of genocide. Some argue that genocide concerns social death, rather than biological death. I am thinking, for instance, of work by Claudia Card (eck) and Mohammed Abed. So, that’s my philosophical reply.
My more personal reply is that when a trans person is not permitted to transition, ‘elimination’ is the most apt word one can find, as a trans person, to describe that. And whenever I try to talk to nontrans people about these issues, I do make clear what I mean. I suspect that most trans people would do so as well – should folks kindly enter into a conversation with them, as you have done so now. I honestly don’t know how else to describe the possibility of being prevented from being who I experience myself most deeply to be. Should such a scenario arise, I would be left something shy of a ghost. Close enough to elimination, for me.
That’s very interesting–and helpful. Thanks!
Perhaps I am paranoid, but if someone says they want to eliminate Catholic-ISM but not Catholics, I do not feel reassured, and I’m not even that Catholic.
How about someone who wants to eliminate Zionism, but who says that that should not give mere Israelis (or Jews) any reason to fear?
I mean, it probably depends a bit on if the person saying it is the Ayatollah or Daniel Kahneman (this is just to draw a distinction, not to literally describe), but in general, yes I can see why this would not be a reassuring distinction to a Jewish/Jewish Israeli person. I don’t think anything in my comment suggested I couldn’t, unless you thought I meant I was a 12th century Catholic?
I’m not, btw.
I don’t think this is a very good analogy. Zionism is a religious-political ideology many Jews do not ascribe to. It is a 150 year old new phenomenon in a 2000+ year old religion. Catholicism is obviously not the same thing.
I disagree. I think all that matters is whether the HHS report is an accurate summary of the medical science. Whether it is or isn’t is independent of anything else the Trump administration has done or is doing. And from my understanding, the HHS report is drawing similar conclusions as similar reports in other countries have drawn.
Surely it’s also relevant whether or not the people authoring this report have relevant expertise in the respective scientific fields, wouldn’t you agree?
Yes.
Jesse Singal:
“I was shocked when I found out who was on the team of external experts commissioned by the HHS to write the report: I was familiar with almost all of them, and they were not cranks at all. They are, as expected, skeptics of rosy narratives about the efficacy of youth gender medicine, to varying degrees. But they are informed skeptics who have been deep in the weeds on these issues for a long time, and a significant number have published peer-reviewed papers on this topic.”
It’s not also relevant how this report fits into a larger agenda? And the uses to which it is being put? (By the way, I do believe the report is a joke). But the point I am making is that to not consider the political and ethical consequences of one’s actions is simply irresponsible.
I don’t think the report should be judged by whether or not it “fits into a larger agenda.” I think it should just be judged on its merits by the criteria of evidence-based medicine.
Now, if you want to argue that by those standards the report is lousy, fair enough. I haven’t read the report. I’m just aware that it arrives at more or less the same conclusions as other reports. And I know that WPATH tried to suppress the publication of a systematic review on youth gender medicine that they commissioned through Johns Hopkins. So, based on my priors, I’m inclined to believe the conclusion the report draws, namely that the evidence for the efficacy of youth gender medicine is weak. Honestly, I don’t think that should come as a surprise. The evidence for a lot of medical interventions is weak:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35447356/
I wonder whether this is a more general position of yours or just about the specifics of this case. Suppose I am a scientist and a fascist regime wants me to write a report on how to build a certain sort of bomb. I know that this regime will use this bomb to obliterate a group of innocent people. In this case, do you think that the uses to which the report is put matter? Or is the only thing that matters that I write an accurate report? (I am asking only about this case).
Good question. I would say you shouldn’t take part in the bomb report for the reason that the bomb is going to be used to obliterate innocent people. Suffice it to say, I think there are relevant disanalogies between that case and Byrne’s (alleged) involvement with the HHS report.
Ok. Good. So, you agree that sometimes there are ethical considerations which outweigh making a contribution. Here is another question: Would it matter to you whether or not Byrne was paid a significant amount of money by the Trump administration to make his contribution? I ask, in part, because, even if we put trans issues aside, as Justin points out, the Trump WH is generally opposed to the sorts of things that philosophy values.
I would have to know if that’s standard practice in order to form a judgement about whether it was wrong for Byrne to be paid a significant amount of money.
For a WH admin to do such a thing or for Byrne to do work of that sort?
Both.
This will be used where I live, if it hasn’t been already, to support the ongoing march of legislation eliminating basic rights and protection for trans people. No easy cause effect measure is possible here but the trickle down effect is real. Particularly grim for young people: we have moved from standard bullying to aggressive, emboldened bullying and teachers who feel powerless to counteract it or even support the behavior, along with so many parents and classmates who speak and act like being trans is an illness rather a normal part of human variation.
Yes, it is a ‘sad state of affairs of the profession‘ when people indulge in idle speculation, rather than relying on evidence.
So your position is (1) it’s irresponsible to say that Byrne did this without proof, and (2) even if he did do it that’s nothing to be ashamed of because (3) the work reflects the truth, even though (4) he has no expertise in the field because (5) the appendix seems seems accurate to you, even though (6) you have no expertise in this field, either. Does that about sum things up?
No, that’s a very poor summary of my position. Here’s what’s wrong with it:
“(1) it’s irresponsible to say that Byrne did this without proof”
My concern isn’t that Justin made baseless allegations against Byrne; it’s that Justin called Byrne’s actions “appalling” without having a clear sense of what Byrne did and why he did it. In other words, no clear allegation of wrongdoing has been made, beyond that Byrne contributed, somehow and for some unknown reason, to an HHS report about a politically sensitive issue.
“(2) even if he did do it that’s nothing to be ashamed of”
I didn’t say this. I said that whether Byrne should be ashamed –and whether we should heap shame on him (as we’ve been doing) — depends on what he contributed to the report and why he contributed it. And we are presently in the dark about what he contributed and why.
“(3) the work reflects the truth”
I didn’t say that the work reflects the truth. I said that the methodology section of the appendix that Byrne allegedly authored seems unobjectionable and that the executive summary of the report does not seem like anti-trans propaganda. For all I know, what the report says is false. But commenters here have alleged that it is a shoddy piece of political propaganda, and that does not seem right to me.
“(4) he has no expertise in the field”
I said that Byrne is an expert. So, this is the opposite of my position.
For what it’s worth, Byrne has published plenty on this issue, and his book on gender cites an enormous quantity of peer-reviewed literature. So, he has a reasonably strong claim to expertise. (Unless, of course, you make adherence to political orthodoxy a criterion of expertise. But, for obvious reasons, we shouldn’t do that, even if we think political orthodoxy is right.)
“(5) the appendix seems accurate to you”
I did not say that the appendix seems accurate. I said that the methodology section of the appendix seems unobjectionable. It is, of course, possible for a literature review that is methodologically sound to come to false conclusions.
“(6) you have no expertise in this field, either”
This is the one thing I said that you got right. But I will point out that most of us here on Daily Nous aren’t experts on gender, so if I’m unqualified to judge whether the methodology of the appendix is sound, given my lack of expertise, then most others here are similarly unqualified. I registered my impressions about the executive summary and appendix in response to others registering their impressions that the report was shoddy and propagandistic. Given our symmetric lack of expertise, our impressions are roughly equally credible.
FYI: Justin didn’t call Byrne’s actions appalling; he offered a conditional statement in which they *would* be appalling. Very different.
True, but the antecedent of the counterfactual was too weak:
This counterfactual is true only if the nearest possible worlds in which Byrne voluntarily contributes to the report are worlds in which he contributes to it wrongfully. But, as I noted above, do not know this; for all we know, the nearest worlds in which Byrne voluntarily contributes to the report are worlds in which he does so for the sake of furthering the truth, curbing the administration’s excesses, etc.
Once again: it all depends on what Byrne contributed and why.
Fair enough.
I’m afraid contributing expertise to Trump and his ilk’s political agenda (however well-intentioned) does not increase the credibility of a set of policies that are clearly and openly being devised to degrade the lives of a small and highly vulnerable group. It does, however, reduce the credibility of those willing contributors, given the use of such expertise as a thin veil for this degradation.
Is it inappropriate?
Or are you just ignorant to the escalation of anti-trans bigotry over the last several years, and the effort for institutional capture that its conservative movement very plainly laid out?
Alex certainly isn’t, and has been very active in the debate that has lead to this point politically.
Regardless, while the republican party makes very clear their intentions to eventually ban trans healthcare, undo workplace protections, housing protections, undo legal recognition, social acceptance, marginalize gender-variant expression, and criminalize trans people, holding our colleagues who collaborate responsible should be the least of our concerns!
Also, he could be affected professionally, and that’s far too steep a consequence for anyone to bear.
To answer your question: it is inappropriate.
I’m not ignorant of anti-trans bigotry. I am, however, in the dark about whether Byrne’s alleged contribution to this report furthers, or was motivated by, anti-trans bigotry (as are you).
So, although holding one’s colleagues accountable for bigotry is important, we shouldn’t publicly shame Byrne for his alleged contribution to the report, based on what we currently know.
By the way: professional ostracization is a very steep consequence. Taking away people’s livelihoods and preventing them from contributing to society in the ways they’re trained to is no small thing.
Word salad thrown up to mask one’s ethical cowardice with empty sophistry, the bad philosopher’s go-to sidestep.
A self-describing comment?
At a minimum, he has offered the report, a tool that will be used to undermine access to trans healthcare, his credibility. This is obvious even just from many of the comments here. I don’t think that pressuring him to publicly account for the extent of his involvement is unwarranted.
And Byrne doesn’t stand to lose his livelihood regardless. have any anti-trans professors have ever lost their livelihood? only, hopefully, maybe some of the credibility he lent.
and perhaps you could give a similar “steep” value to consequences trans people will feel as a result of this report and demand answers from your colleague.
“At a minimum, he has offered the report, a tool that will be used to undermine access to trans healthcare, his credibility. This is obvious… ”
He offered the report his credibility by allowing them to use his name… buried deep within some metadata that some obsessive person churned through, in order to find him, which nobody would ever have heard about had it not been for this?
That’s the outrage here?
Yes. That is now a consequence of his participation.
That “obsessive” person is a trans legal researcher who is interested in protecting the rights of trans people under an openly eliminationist right wing government. Her job is, of course, to scrutinize the tools that government is developing to acheive those ends.
Regardless of Byrne’s intentions, and if the administration plans to openly name him to the project in the future, that he is now known to have worked on the report seems to have clearly offered it credibility to many here, who are otherwise unfamiliar with the biases in this research.
I hate to break it to you, but philosophers are not experts on this topic.
I am skeptical that we hold expertise of any kind. We are hardly more than opinion columnists. Even the philosophers working closest with the scientists are often a step back in their professed expertise of their area.
Let this conversation take place between those who practice medicine and their patients.
Here is the view from The Economist about the HHS review: https://archive.is/hjmXV
Good for Alex. Making a difference to one of the worst medical scandals of the 21st century – as much of the rest of the philosophical community continues to exhibit a remarkable indifference.
Have any of you actually met any trans youth? Have you met any parents of trans youth? Do you know what it is like to be trans youth? Do you know what it is like to go through puberty experiencing gender dysphoria? Do you have any idea what it is like then have to deal with the consequences of that for the rest of your life? Nontrans people overlook the fact that going through puberty IS already irreversible. I am so sick of people talking like experts when they really have no clue at all about trans experience. Seriously.
Wow – what an arrogantly insensitive comment. At least now we know where Daniel stands.
Daniel’s comment was not arrogant, nor was it insensitive. He might be mistaken that Byrne’s contribution was a good thing, that gender-affirming care is a bad thing, and that the philosophical community is remarkably indifferent to the bad-making features of gender-affirming care. But one can be mistaken about these things without being arrogant or insensitive.
Technically, that’s true. And, it is difficult to judge tone in online interactions. But I think my intuitions here are probably accurate. Will await further evidence to the contrary…
Until recently I did not comment publicly on this issue because I had deliberately avoided reading about it–the debates have been unpleasant and have cut across coalitions of people whose work I have admired. I am also not a professional philosopher. Professionally speaking I sit somewhere between “hobbyist” and “failed philosopher”. But I want to say that it is increasingly clear to me that there is something deeply sinister lurking at the margins of “gender critical” philosophy. Some of the philosophers and graduate students who pointed this out from the beginning seem to have suffered significant reputational damage.
If it turns out that Byrne contributed to this document–and I will note that neither Byrne nor his supporters seem interested in denying that he did so–then this demonstrates an appalling lack of judgment and (I think) an unwholesome zeal for making life difficult for trans people. Even if the report is perfectly measured and scientifically flawless (I very much doubt that it is), we should be under no doubt about the use that will be made of it by the Trump administration.
trump and his ilk already knew what they thought and wanted this report to conclude. the question is if this review was critical and scientific enough to either support or put into question what those ideologues think. it appears the report supports their conclusions from what I gather. Many here do not like that fact. So hopefully the scientists will study this more. One one level of analysis and to the extent we are discussing a biological -medical issue we ought to respect that there may be facts we don’t like. However, facts are often and in significant ways overdetermined. Meaning and interpretation is always involved. The intertwining of developmental psychology and social construction, with all the feedback loops around value and identity are dizzying. So defining ‘harm’ needs to be elaborated, whether it is the alleged harm to a child receiving medical intervention or the harm to the child who cannot receive such intervention. And, how does the child ‘know’ they are trans anyway? ‘Trans’ and gender are categories used to interpret a set of experiences, psychological states and social interactions, but is not something ‘given’ in the same way a body part or condition is. Dysphoria is an experience connected with the nonalignment or tension between physical states, psychological states, social expectations and performances and so on. What the dysphoria means and how to resolve it also arent given, but require interpretation
Two observations that haven’t been made here yet:
First, some prominent “GC”s (at least Byrne and Stock) used to steadfastly insist that they desire that trans people can live a their lives free from discrimination (but they want to get the metaphysics right, or whatever). Even if you think that there is some truth here that needs telling, this report is incompatible with this desire.
There is no, for example, attempt in this report to temper this administration’s agenda or present an empathetic picture of trans lives. But such things would be expected of someone who considered this report an opportunity to shifting politics in a positive direction while having the desire to let trans people live free lives.
Second, whenever someone alleged that “GC” philosophers make common cause with reactionaries, the response was denial, “guilt by association” etc. But here we have common cause, clear as day (for the reasons just outlined). We can cease the “guilt by association” discourse.
I understand that people here have, ahem, different moral positions on “GC” philosophy. But even so, all of us can now dispense with the facile presumption that “GC”s are not reactionaries or are in any way concerned with the well-being of trans people. Ongoing and future debates would greatly benefit from honesty on these two matters.
“some prominent “GC”s (at least Byrne and Stock) used to steadfastly insist that they desire that trans people can live a their lives free from discrimination (but they want to get the metaphysics right, or whatever). Even if you think that there is some truth here that needs telling, this report is incompatible with this desire.”
Why are they incompatible?
2. “here we have common cause, clear as day (for the reasons just outlined). We can cease the ‘guilt by association’ discourse.”
Please spell out your reasoning.
“But even so, all of us can now dispense with the facile presumption that “GC”s are not reactionaries or are in any way concerned with the well-being of trans people.”
Again: please provide your reasoning.
I gave reasons in my second full paragraph (below “incompatible with this desire”). Could you say what part you didn’t follow?
It’s not that I didn’t follow what you wrote: it’s that your conclusion didn’t follow.
It is wholly consistent for someone to hope that adult trans people can live free from discrimination, while not seeing a report on the medical pros and cons of gender-affirming care for minors as “an opportunity to shifting (sic) politics in a positive direction.” And that’s a problem for your leap to conclusions even if we grant you, for some reason, that Byrne actively contributed to the report, and that he had some say in its political direction, and that his sins (if he has any here) are shared by all gender critical thinkers.
I was offering you an opportunity to correct the impression you left that you cannot be trusted to make simple inferences. Apparently, that impression was already correct.
If you followed my argument, you could’ve critiqued it in good faith instead of pretending that I didn’t give one.
Your apparent rebuttal – that it is consistent to have a desire while freely acting against it – does not strike me as convincing (on largely folk psychological grounds).
Imagine a similar report on the dangers of vaccination. The report credulously enumerates all the “mights” and “mays” and “coulds” from the anti-vax literature, but gives scant attention to the data showing vaccine effectiveness and safety.
A (self-designated) expert contributed to the report but strenuously insists that he supports vaccination. We can here clearly see that this is facile. Someone sincerely supportive of vaccination would have either prepared a different report or not contributed at all. (Or perhaps was threatened or paid a large sum of money, I guess).
It’s the same here: contributing to *this* report in the context of *this* administration’s agenda is incompatible with wishing that trans people be able to live free from discrimination. You can’t be someone’s stooge and sincerely disavow their goals.
I followed your argument. You are jumping to conclusions all over the place, including the conclusion that anyone who consults in the preparation of a report (if Byrne was, which is very much in question) is in a position to dictate what the entire report says.
Also, your vaccine case is not at all analogous, for the same reason I just tried to explain to you. One of the main things you’re missing here is, again, the fact that support for the rights of transgender adults is not in any clear tension with entertaining doubts about the efficacy of gender-affirming care for children. But your vaccination case shows that you have failed to understand this simple concept, since it presents the same person as being in favor of vaccination while at the same time undermining that goal.
Your calling Byrne a ‘stooge’ is an uncalled-for and unprofessional smearing of his name. If you do not withdraw that comment, you should be made to. Nobody can stop you from making laughably unfair inferences, but others’ reputations should not be made to suffer from your intellectual incompetence.
One certainly does excellent philosophy when they castigate others and say that they should be made to withdraw a comment.
Compelled speech. Certainly the highest level of philosophy.
Ok, maybe calm down.
Sure, in isolation we can perhaps imagine a creature who is simultaneously supportive of trans adults and unsupportive of trans kids (though notice how I have been speaking of “trans people” throughout).
But we aren’t in isolation, we are in a pretty clear context (the report mentions the relevant EO in its preamble!). It is entirely clear in pursuit of which goals this report has been commissioned, and so which goals anyone who contributed to it is furthering. The assertion that someone could have contributed to *this* report while sincerely rejecting these goals is, as said, facile — facile because one must ignore most of the context in order to make this assertion.
No amount of ad hominems will change that.
“the fact that support for the rights of transgender adults is not in any clear tension with entertaining doubts about the efficacy of gender-affirming care for children”
this is so essential and what seems to keep getting lost in these discussions.
I think part of the reason is that it is very easy to slide over from a consideration of ‘trangender rights’ to an assertion of the need to accept ‘transgender ontology’. In my view these arent the same and require argument, but it seems that for many if one doesnt accept the assumptions of transgender ontology one is opposed to transgender rights. And if one accepts transgender ontology then to not allow transgender children to recieve affirming care is equivalent to harming them.
But if one doesnt accept in totality this ontology one can still be respectful of transgender rights in the sense that within a liberal framework one can be respectful and protective of any adult persons right to pursue happiness, have their own beliefs and conscience, and live the life they choose, within the limits of not harming others. Just consider how I can respect someone following their own religion and believing in whatever they want to, as long as they don’t impose it on me or harm people. I can respect this even if I believe their beliefs are completely crazy. I dont need to agree with them in other words.
I know this is getting off the topic here which is the report, which is supposedly a medical report critically reviewing evidence and subject to correction. The report may or not be correct or adequate as far as medical evidence is concerned. If one doesnt assume trangender ontology thats the only issue. But, if one does assume transgender ontology, no evidence would actually matter since the childrens condition needs to be corrected because it is who and what they are
the medical question gets confused with the ontological one
You say that the report makes no attempt to “present an empathetic picture of trans lives.” But what about these paragraphs from the Foreword?
These paragraphs seem to me to paint an empathetic picture of trans youth and their parents.
Out of curiosity: Are there any parts of the report that struck you as mean-spirited or callous?
The executive orders requesting the review covered the mean-spiritedness and callousness calling trans people deceptive and their bodies mutilated. The review itself is supposed to serve the same function as bigoted laws, and it’s usefulness is undermined by plainly reflecting the underlying bigotry and biases that motivated it.
But no, I don’t think a paternalistic and objectifying approach to stripping medical rights from people is “painting an empathetic picture”. Unlike animals, trans adolescents can speak, and are in-fact very vocal about their wants in medical autonomy. But if we centered their voices, maybe readers like you might find that biased.
Perhaps the executive orders are mean-spirited and callous. But Julian claimed that the report makes no attempt to present trans youth and their parents empathetically. That’s what I was asking about.
By the way: if the callousness and mean-spiritedness of the executive orders didn’t carry over to the report, that’s a win! Perhaps this was Byrne’s doing.
is it as win? my point is about the irrelevance of what passes, your seemingly low bar, for empathetic perspective, in a piece that is, and was conceived of, as a blatant political tool to attack the rights a scapegoated minority group. If that was the extent of Byrne’s contribution, then still this paternalistic rhetoric and his participation itself only serves in making the report seem credible to people like you.
This is empathy for children, but not necessarily trans children; nor empathy for trans lives (as they actually are).
I can in one breath say ‘I care about children’ and in the next say ‘but think that trans medical care should not exist.’ If I hold the belief that gender-affirming care is (allegedly scientifically) unsupported and harmful to children I can say that I feel bad for children in these situations, that I feel bad for their parents, and yet think that as trans persons or children they should not exist as trans.
And this paragraph can certainly convey that non-empathy for trans children, but make it sound much nicer and as if I am expressing the kind of empathy you’re reading in.
Is the point of disagreement from GC and other people who would be motivated to produce such a report not simply that they do not think children can meaningfully be “trans” as an identity?
The first paragraph explicitly mentions “trans-identified children and adolescents.” It’s not about children in general.
Moreover, even if the authors of the report doubt that one’s gender can fail to align with one’s sex, and so doubt that trans-identified children are genuinely trans (in the sense that their genders fail to align with their sexes), this does not amount to lacking empathy for those children. One needn’t lack empathy for someone in order to think that they’re mistaken about their gender.
For example: Suppose a male child expresses a desire to live as a girl, demonstrates severe discomfort with their sexed body parts, prefers feminine to masculine role models, etc., but insists that they are not a girl because they believe that girls can’t have penises.
Many philosophers would say that this child is mistaken about their gender. Does that mean those philosophers have no empathy for the child? Clearly not — in fact, most of them would say that the empathetic thing to do would be to correct the child’s (alleged) misconception that girls can’t have penises, in hopes that the child will realize the truth about their gender.
So, even if the authors of the report doubt that trans children are trans, that does not mean they lack empathy for trans children.
You say that I’m reading empathy into the above paragraphs. But I think it’s more likely that you’re reading callousness into them.
If I think that ontologically ‘trans’ is a mistake, then the first paragraph does not, in fact, read as you say. Not also that it does not say ‘trans children’ it says ‘trans-identified.’ Not empathy for trans children as trans.
The rest of your reply misunderstands the point being made. Take the following:
I’ve not stated anything to this effect. I’m sure that you’re correct, and they likely do think that.
But that’s not empathy for a trans child, it’s empathy for a trans child. The point being made is that there is no empathy for trans identity, trans experience, trans lives, and so on. A general empathy for children or persons is not the same as an empathy for trans lives.
I’m having trouble understanding the distinction you draw between having empathy for a trans child and having empathy for a trans child.
The objects of empathy are people (or animals, other welfare subjects). So, having empathy for a trans child entails having empathy for a child who is trans. Presumably, having empathy for a trans child entails the same thing. So, both attitudes have the same object. Since both attitudes also have the same valence, it’s hard to see what distinguishes them. On the contrary, they seem like the same attitude.
One can, of course, have empathy for a child who is trans without approving of gender-affirming care, or while thinking the child is mistaken about their gender. Perhaps that’s what you mean by saying that some people have empathy for trans children but not for trans children.
But if that’s what you mean, then the alleged deficiency you point to isn’t a lack of empathy — it’s something else.
No, I do mean a lack of empathy.
And no, having empathy for a trans child does not entail having empathy for a trans child. Empathy is not identical. There is not a single feeling of empathy.
I can have empathy for a dog, but that doesn’t mean that my empathy for a human person is like my empathy for a dog. Empathy is not identical across objects.
The problem seems to be that I’m emphasising empathy (or the lack thereof) for persons with a particular experience. And valuing that particular experience.
To have empathy for a trans child is to have empathy for them as a child (and a person, and so on), but also to have empathy for them as trans. It is to understand, appreciate, care for, and value, their experience as trans.
When I say that some A lacks empathy for a trans child B, it may be the case that A has empathy for B, as a child. But not a particularised empathy around the experience of being trans.
EDIT: It looks like I missed the comment below and consequently misunderstood the point. My bad!
Here’s an example:
Perhaps you’ve recently lost your job. I’ve also lost a job before. So, perhaps I have empathy for you. I know what that feels like, what hardship it can produce. And so on. I can value your experience, understand that it’s perhaps frustrating, depressing, or a number of other feelings.
But, perhaps you’re a different race than I am. Or you’re an immigrant from another country, whereas I am not. I may not know what those particular feelings are like for you. I may try to empathise with you, but my feeling here for you is not quite the same as my feeling for you in the above where I have experienced the relevant thing before. It’s perhaps more general and abstracted. I may ask you questions about what it’s like to be you, what things you feel, and I may try to understand those things and value what you say and your experiences.
Now, what if instead, we’re talking about children and trans persons? Well, I may have a general empathy for children. I think that they matter. And so on. And I can empathise along those lines.
However, if I think that trans identity does not matter, or that there is no such thing, etc., then it’s unlikely that I empathise with them along these lines. If empathy means to understand and share the feelings of another, I may not share any such feelings, because I do not think that trans is a real identity.
So, in the case as you present it, whilst there may be a general empathy for the fact that this question involves a child; it does not follow from that that there is a particular care for or value of that child’s (or any other trans persons) experiences as trans.
This makes sense. Thanks for clarifying.
Which philosophers in particular, among the “many”, would say that a child who insists he is not a girl is mistaken about the “truth” of his gender?
Huh?
This passage strikes me as rather paternalistic (a la ‘I will determine what is best for you’) and as prioritizing social contestedness over individual flourishing.
It’s easy to say “I care about you and want the best for you” with no empathy at all, if one takes oneself to be the unilateral arbiter of what is best for someone else.
I mean, we know this *exact language* from it being leveled against gay kids just a few years ago: “it might be better not to be gay”, “are you sure it’s not some mental condition or distress that makes you act out”, “there are socially contested issues to be considered here” … that’s the opposite of being empathetic!
What you seem to be saying is this: although the paragraphs I quoted seem to express empathy, they don’t in fact do so, because they’re paternalistic.
This assumes that paternalism is incompatible with empathy. But that’s clearly false: parents can (and should!) be both empathetic and paternalistic toward their children.
Perhaps there’s something problematic about paternalism in this particular context. But I see no reason why paternalism rules out empathy in this particular context. Paternalism and empathy are compatible, even if they aren’t equally appropriate in every situation.
(Anyway, paternalism is appropriate in most medical contexts. Doctors are allowed — indeed, expected — to refuse to administer treatment that would, in their professional judgment, harm their patients more than it would help them. Since this report is about whether gender-affirming care harms patients more than it helps them, it isn’t clear that a paternalistic attitude is the wrong one to have.)
Would you say that the homophobe who wants to force the homosexual to undergo conversion therapy is demonstrating empathy?
No.
So it seems that paternalism can rule out empathy in a particular context. Though, I think ‘rule out’ might be untidy language. Namely, if that paternalism is such that we think it may be misguided.
We can imagine that the homophobe does genuinely believe that being gay is ‘wrong’ and can be ‘cured’ through conversion therapy. On this view, they think they’re trying to help. But, we might say that they lack empathy for the homosexual as as a homosexual (they’ve not taken time to appreciate that experience, value it, and so on).
Their paternalistic intent to override the autonomy of the homosexual is wrong, and they are not demonstrating [the right kind of] empathy.
“paternalism is appropriate in most medical contexts” – what an unwieldy claim to just throw out there as some sort of additional support, as if it isn’t extremely controversial.
If it’s paternalistic to withhold medical treatment that one deems harmful, then I don’t think it’s “extremely controversial” that physicians should sometimes be paternalistic. Are you suggesting that there’s extreme controversy about whether physicians should acquiesce to patients’ demands for treatment that they (the physicians) deem harmful?
It’s possible that this is right; I’m not a bioethicist. But it would be surprising.
No, I’m asserting that it’s strange to make assertions of such wide scope in an effort to undercut the charge of problematic paternalism, even while acknowledging that one lacks the relevant expertise to make the assertion. But yes, I would expect deep disagreement over the question you highlight (if only because paternalism is deeply controversial). But then again, I’m not a bioethicist either (nor do I pretend to be when it’s convenient or aligned with my political values).
No I don’t even think this passage _seems_ to be empathetic. It quite obviously is not empathetic, and neither does it seem to be. Hence my “huh?” — I’m genuinely surprised that someone would consider this a counterexample.
You might mean by “empathy” any kind of concern for another’s well-being. But that is not correct.
I don’t mean to get us lost in semantics, but there is a form of paternalism that is mutually exclusive with empathy and that can be roughly defined as follows: concern with a person’s well-being where the measure of well-being is solely on the terms of the one who holds the concern. That’s not empathy.
It is this kind of paternalism that is displayed in the passage you quoted (and indeed throughout the document, with its wholesale dismissals of individual satisfaction as a measure).
For the record, paternalism isn’t “appropriate in most medical contexts”. A doctor isn’t, for example, supposed to force unwanted procedures onto patients even if the doctor thinks it would be greatly beneficial to the patient. Conversely, a doctor isn’t supposed to deny a treatment that is in their professional opinion suboptimal if the patient has declined other treatments. (Unless this conflicts with some other moral principle.)
I don’t think empathy reduces to concern for another person’s wellbeing.
The parts of the relevant paragraphs I had in mind were the parts that described (approvingly) parents’ motives for pursuing gender-affirming care, acknowledged the struggle faced by trans youth and parents of trans youth, and acknowledged the moral, social, and psychological complexity of that struggle.
Maybe you don’t think this was a successful attempt to empathize with trans youth and their parents. But it seems like an attempt.
I guess if it is an attempt, it’s the same attempt made by the gay conversion therapist who tries to empathize with the “struggle” of being gay but in the end imposes their own notion of what’s a good life — as opposed to attempting to see what a good life would be for that person on their terms.
Regarding the point about doctors: I agree that it would be wrong for a doctor to force someone to receive treatment against their will, or to withhold treatment that would help the patient on the grounds that it was suboptimal.
But it would also be wrong for a doctor to administer treatment that would, in their judgment, bring net harm to the patient. This is not the same thing as administering a suboptimal treatment: a treatment may be suboptimal but still bring net benefit to the patient.
I may have used the word “paternalistic” too hastily. Perhaps what I should have said is that withholding treatment that one thinks would harm one’s patient isn’t paternalistic. Either way, the passages I quoted (in the context of the rest of the report) don’t seem paternalistic in a way that is inappropriate in medical contexts.
This is turning into a distraction, but I think you might underestimate how central patient autonomy (both negative as in rejecting treatment and positive as in choosing treatment) is in medical ethics.
A commonly discussed case of the shape you describe (“a doctor to administer treatment that would, in their judgment, bring net harm to the patient”) would be a doctor rejecting performing a vasectomy or tubal ligation on a patient they deem “too young” for such a procedure. That kind of paternalism (“you’ll change your mind”) is also typically regarded as wrong.
This is just to say that medical ethics is a good deal more complex than “net harm”. And, for the record, it is (therefore) rather obvious that no serious medical ethicist was involved in the preparation of this report.
I wrote something longer that got lost, so in brief (I’ll try to delete
if the other turns up):
A case like the one you describe (“a doctor to administer treatment that would, in their judgment, bring net harm to the patient”) is one in which a doctor refuses to perform a vasectomy or tubal ligation on a young patient because the doctor thinks “they’ll change their mind”. This is typically regarded as wrong or at least murky.
I think you might underestimate the central role of patient autonomy (both in rejecting and in choosing treatment) in medical ethics. This field really is a good deal more complex than “net harm” (partially because this isn’t really a determinate variable). Incidentally, this is why it is rather obvious that no serious medical ethicist was involved with this report.
Hi Justin W.,
Question about your view: Do you think it’s bad that Byrne participated in producing the report *because the report is bad on its merits*–and hence that it would not be appalling if it were actually a good, responsible report? Or do you think it’s bad that Byrne participated regardless of the merits *because of who he cooperated with in its production*? I can’t quite suss out which is your position from the post above.
I hope it is clear (in the hothouse of internet toxicity) that this is not asked in bad faith! I just think ‘Is this report any good?’ and ‘Is it okay to cooperate with Trump et al. to produce a (consequential) report?’ are questions helpfully treated separately.
The report is the result of an executive order from the president to produce a review with very particular conclusions. This may seem like an “out there” position in philosophy of science, and I’m not up on my post-Popper views on the demarcation problem, but it’s actually not very good methodology to decide on your conclusions ahead of time by executive fiat, and then produce a report supportive of those conclusions.
Hi Simon. I like the replies already made to you made by Lewis and Esteban. But I’ll add a bit more.
You gave me two explanations to choose between—the report is bad on its merits, or it’s bad that to cooperate with the Trump administration—but those aren’t the only options, and neither quite capture the objection I’d have to a colleague contributing to this report. I’ll say what my objection is shortly, but first I’ll say a little about each of the explanations you offered.
So, is my objection here that the report itself is “bad on its merits”? No. I’m not in a position to speak with any authority on that, as I haven’t read most of it, nor am I an expert on these matters. There are reasons to be suspicious of the quality of the report, an important one of which Lewis gives in his reply to you. But were the report found to be of reasonable quality I’d still have an objection to a colleague helping to produce it.
Is it bad to cooperate with the Trump administration? In my view there’s a reasonable presumption that it is. Trump seems to me to be a terrible person doing some terrible things. But ultimately the answer about the ethics of cooperating with Trump is “it depends”. It depends on what you’d be cooperating with Trump to do and why, what the effects of such cooperation are likely to be, the nature and extent of the cooperation, the costs to you of cooperating or failing to, whether you’d be able to maintain your integrity, and so on.
My objection to cooperating with Trump to produce this report has to do with those details. Trump seems quite happy to pulverize the trans community—for political gain, for the pleasure he takes in domination, and maybe even because he occasionally thinks it is a way to be righteous. It’s horrible. Whatever your views are about the metaphysics of sex and gender, or about trans persons in sports or prisons, or about what kinds of medical care trans youth should have—topics which are difficult and about which it’s not unreasonable to have various views—the Trump administration’s cruelty towards, and indifference to the suffering of, trans persons should be quite clear. (And not just trans persons, of course, and their loved ones, too, but various other populations.) The carelessness with which the administration treats the lives of those it considers others is astounding.
Regardless of its quality, I take the study to obviously be a political instrument in service of Trump’s anti-trans agenda, as it is the result of an executive order that announced its conclusions in advance (the language of “maiming” and “mutilating” in the order further indicating the administration’s heartlessness and disrespect). Voluntarily working in service to this cruelty is what I’d consider appalling.
BUT WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN? Might not someone who disagrees with some of Trump’s moves against trans persons who are adults (e.g., kicking them out of the military, removing anti-discrimination protections) nonetheless be worried about children in the volatility of youth undergoing serious medical procedures they might later regret? Isn’t that a reasonable concern? And might it be worth collaborating with a cruel would-be dictator, even at the cost of lending him some credibility and providing him with ammo that will surely cause collateral damage, if it will help some of these children?
I don’t think that’s enough of a defense. Suppose you’re worried about kids in just the way articulated in the previous passage. Heck, I have that worry to some degree. But do you know who else has that worry? The kids, their parents, and their doctors. No one is more worried about those kids than their parents. Are you a parent? Do you love your kid? Would you let your child undergo any kind of risky medical procedure unless you were as sure as you could be that it was on balance the better option for them? Of course not. Guess what: you’re not special. The parents of trans children love and care for their children just as much as you love and care for yours. They probably know quite a lot about the risks and benefits of the various courses of action available to them and their children, and they certainly are more dedicated to making the right decisions for their children than anyone else.
The idea that the worry about trans children could justify producing this report and thereby joining in Trump’s attack on the liberties and security of trans people relies on a degree of epistemic confidence that hardly seems warranted, as well as what seems to me to be a dehumanization of trans children and their parents. That joining a campaign of cruelty would also involve hubristically disrespecting others is not a point in its favor.
There’s more to say, of course, but this is already probably a longer answer than you were expecting or wanting, and there are other things to do. Thanks for your question, Simon.
Thanks for the thoughtful reply, Justin.
A number of commenters here seem to think that it’s possible to work with this administration in good faith (e.g., “let’s collaborate together to find truth”). I’m just not sure why anyone would think that. In fact I’m totally baffled by it, to the point that I am embarrassed for anyone who holds such a view.
Now, if you want to work with this administration in some particular case because doing so is strategically prudent for advancing some particular end, that’s another thing. That’s politics. And if that’s what Byrne is doing, it’s perfectly understandable (even though I think it’s morally wrong). I’d do the same thing, if I had his views (I don’t).
So the entire staff of Justice and HHS should resign?
only f they can’t meaningfully obstruct, delay, and frustrate
I would reply as Can Read has already, and add: They should stay in those positions if they think doing so will be effective in achieving the ends of those positions (or whatever other ends they have). In many cases I think this is in fact true (i.e., my view doesn’t entail mass resignation). What these people shouldn’t do is expect any kind of sincerity, truthfulness, any sense of a shared framework or cooperative venture, and so on, from the likes of Trump, RFK Jr., etc. (not that they need me to tell them this).
Or act in bad faith! I detect in your question a sort of incredulity that working with the Trump administration should be taken to be automatically suspect. But I don’t understand the incredulity. Surely you can imagine political regime so bad as to make it clear that working with them is only ever at best going to be strategically prudent. At that point, we’re just haggling over whether the Trump administration is that bad. I think it clearly is. Do you have reasons to disagree?
Although this administration is egregiously worse than most (all?) of its predecessors, I think “work with the administration only because doing so is strategically prudent for achieving some particular end” is good advice whatever administration we’re talking about. All administrations have political ulterior motives; that’s how it goes.
If, say, a legal academic or philosopher was asked to join a Biden administration panel on abortion or supreme court reform, or a George W Bush panel on counterterrorism ethics, they would be naive to assume that it would be conducted as a dispassionate search for the truth unburdened by politics – but they still might think it was strategically prudent to join.
Similarly, suppose someone at Los Alamos asked me, as a physics-informed philosopher and senior academic, to be the tame philosopher in a working group to discuss some strategy question about nuclear counterproliferation or communication about nuclear strategy or something. (Not very likely, but I suppose not quite impossible.) I’d be pretty cautious, because of the administration’s appalling record on basic honesty, but I’d probably still say yes, because in expectation I’d think that there was enough plausible overlap in goals on this specific issue that I could make some useful contribution.
Justin, I find this whole post both philosophically and politically silly.
It’s philosophically silly because isn’t one of the core practices we are taught that you attack the ideas and not the people? Isn’t ad hominem a fallacy? You’re making guilt-by-association “arguments” (really, gestures) with no epistemic value.
It’s also politically silly. It seems as if the broadly-left coalition (my coalition) is just allergic to power. We don’t win by constantly doing self-righteous witch-hunts amongst anyone in our circle. This kind of thirst for moral purity and cancellation is why the left coalition is so unpopular despite a historically unpopular president.
You might reply, well what Byrne is doing here is so beyond the pale that you have no intention of conversing and arguing with him or his ilk of anything.
Well, if that’s your line, then I hope you enjoy being out of power. I don’t.
It’s not politically silly to refuse to participate in the production of propaganda for your political opponents.
It is not academically silly to refuse to deploy your putative academic expertise and reputation for a project that has a pre-arranged conclusion stipulated by executive fiat, and which will be the conclusion of the report, irrespective of the evidence on the ground (in fact, that is what makes the report propaganda, rather than science).
The idea that participating in making this report would provide access to power, rather than making one a tool of this administration’s goals is laughable
I did not say that it would have been silly for Alex Byrne to have refused to participate in the report. I said it is silly for Justin to make this particular post. Your response seems to take me to have said the former rather than the latter.
Sorry I agree that I did phrase it as though you were suggesting that the thing blocking our coalition’s access to power was more people not doing what Byrne is suspected of doing, and the criticisms of doing such things. I did take it that you thought that was the issue. I don’t think doing such things is the key to getting power nor do I think tolerating such is the key to getting power.
The idea is that we’re supposed to be quiet and acquiesce when an ally attacks trans people, because otherwise we won’t have that ally on our side when we go after Trump for stuff that actually matters? This view seems misguided to me in two ways.
First, although anti-trans people often portray it otherwise, in fact this anti-trans stuff is rather unpopular, and one can more easily build a broadly-left coalition by excluding the anti-trans people than by including them.
Second, even granting the anti-trans stuff is popular and that your coalition gets smaller by excluding the anti-trans people, surely one must care about what your coalition can accomplish, and if the only way to build an effective coalition is to give up on trans people, at that point I think one might reasonably say “to hell with the coalition, I would prefer lesser efficacy and trans advocacy than the alternative,” right? To say otherwise seems to me to improperly value transpeople.
I did not say that one ought to be quiet and acquiesce. Attack away, but do it at the level of arguments, not guilt-by-association.
As to the political level of analysis, it is an empirical claim whether one can more easily build a winning a broad-left coalition by excluding anti-trans people. I feel like broad-left did largely exclude the anti-trans to a large extent and lost. So that’s at least some evidence against your view. I realize there are many many confounders, so I’m not super-confident in the empirical claim.
To your second point (in which we work under the supposition that including “anti-trans” (I will grudgingly grant you this label for the sake of discussion) is a more winning coalition), I think you’re painting with too broad a brush. In politics, you have to win, and if you demand moral perfection and not make coalitions, the barbarians will burn your city. My thought is: join with the “anti-trans” people who will help you defeat the genuine trans-haters. Allying with moderate “anti-trans” folks isn’t giving up on trans people. It’s trying to provide them the best outcome given what’s politically possible.
Henry Ford was a notorious anti-semite but he and his company were crucial to the American WW2 effort. Did he do it help European Jews? No. But he helped them nevertheless. Should the US have refused his help for being anti-semitic?
This is what I mean by being allergic to power. If you will take power only if it’s perfect, well, you won’t get it.
Please stop with the “guilt by association” shtick, it doesn’t apply when two people have intentionally and willfully teamed up. It’s not a magic spell that turns accomplices into bystanders.
How does one ‘moderately’ deny the legitimate existence or rights of a minority group?
This doesn’t seem to be ‘allergic to power’, either. If I am a trans person, you’re hardly selling me on the idea that I’m better off with you in power than the other guy, since you’re here to take away my rights as well.
You throw out the old “Critical Thinking” chestnut that “It’s philosophically silly because isn’t one of the core practices we are taught that you attack the ideas and not the people? Isn’t ad hominem a fallacy?” I have to say that recent events and just living a life into middle age have made me more and more skeptical of the way this principle is deployed. Of course we should be open to good arguments from people we disagree with. It would even be epistemically vicious not to sometimes seek out the arguments of intelligent and sincere people with whom one seriously disagrees. But who is making an argument very clearly matters and it would be silly to say otherwise. For one thing, there is an unavoidable judgment about whether to take the person seriously at all and if so how seriously. It is at least possible that Richard Filmer or Curtis Yarvin’s work contains brilliant criticisms of liberalism. But I’d still advise any political philosopher not to waste their time with them. Why? Well we can be pretty sure they don’t and that say Hobbes or Hegel is a better bet. I’m not crazy about them, but I’d even admit that Deneen or Vermeule would be much better people to read on this subject. I’d also be a lot more confident that a passage I’m reading from say Hobbes or Nozick has some intelligent meaning it’s worth my time to charitably reconstruct than I would a similar passage from Ayn Rand. Or to put it bluntly very few people would think that we ought to read lobbying packets put together by the alcohol or gambling industries if we were trying to decide about the harmfulness of booze or gambling. If students’ take away from “Critical Thinking” is that they should never think about who is making an argument and why when evaluating that argument than we have made them far more foolish and less able to effectively seek truth than they were before they were exposed to philosophy.
But even putting that aside you’re making a pretty obvious category mistake here yourself. Let’s grant that we shouldn’t think about the person making an argument when we evaluate that argument. That doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t think about why a person is making an argument when we evaluate that person, which we may well do in deciding how we should talk to others ourself or deal with this person. Nor does the truth of an argument shield the person from moral condemnation. Imagine that someone made an argument that the historical estimate for deaths in the Holocaust was wrong and that the actual number of deaths was closer to 4 million (I take it that estimates range from 4-8 million. If I’m dead wrong on then someone with more historical knowledge correct me). Now they might make a decent argument for that claim and in some contexts I wouldn’t think badly of someone who made that argument. In others I’d think very badly of them indeed though. Say if it seemed that they were, or even may, be making the argument only to upset and offend someone who had relatives who died in the Holocaust. If I knew that in other contexts they had engaged in full on Holocaust denial would with no hesitation interpret what they were currently doing as something far more sinister– i.e. getting a foot in the door for full on Holocaust denialism– and so judge them. Now obviously I wouldn’t put this on all fours with Holocaust denial or even the sort of wink wink anti-semitism edgelords love, but I do take it that Justin’s claims are mainly that we should condemn Byrne and what is doing here and that we shouldn’t do likewise.
And as for the in power argument… Please this is honestly just dumb. There’s absolutely no good evidence that this whole debate about how to treat trans kids in schools played a major role in Trump’s victory. Exit polls pretty consistently pointed to inflation and immigration as deciding factors. Perhaps more importantly, the 2024 election was part of a larger trend of incumbent parties getting walloped this year. In fact, it’s worth noting that the Democrats did quite a bit better than a lot of incumbent parties did. A close loss looks bad, but not when one puts it in context of the drubbing that say the Tories, Macron’s lackeys, or the parties in the last German government took this year. Also, let’s not pretend that you, I, or anyone else here is likely to be “in power” unless by power you mean something like faculty senate or getting picked as an elder in church to do the Lord’s busywork. If that is what you mean then I have to say, that my refusal to make being cruel to trans people into some kind of virtue has never kept me out of power.
Ad hominem is a fallacy if you are trying to logically establish whether a particular claim is true or false. But if you are trying to persuade someone, then ad hominem is the only method – you need to identify that person’s commitments, and show how some conclusion is connected to those commitments.
I don’t think either of these things is what is going on here. We are talking about participation in a political process. As a good consequentialist, I think it is important to think about what the consequences of this particular participation will be. There are many sorts of divestment movements that I think are silly, because there are no useful consequences that follow from the relevant divestment. But when it comes to producing government reports, there’s a lot more to think about in terms of what these government reports will be used to do.
I think that if the Trump administration were to ask an economist to draft a report on the consequences of the abolition of the penny, that would be a reasonable process to participate in, despite many of the other issues with the Trump administration. But if they were to ask someone to produce a report on left-wing student anti-semitism (pointedly excluding any investigation of anti-semitism from any other parts of society, and pointedly excluding any investigation of bias against any other groups) then that would be something to be much more cautious of.
“[I]f you are trying to persuade someone, then ad hominem is the only method – you need to identify that person’s commitments, and show how some conclusion is connected to those commitments.”
I don’t understand this. Skeptical is talking about the ad hominem fallacy, in which a person’s character is attacked instead of, and in order to discredit, their argument. If I say that a flat-Earther is an idiot and a scoundrel, and thus he is wrong about the shape of the planet, that’s an ad hominem. If I instead say that he’s seen photos of the round Earth, and he typically trusts photos, and so on—if I “identify his commitments and show how” the round Earth conclusion “is connected to them”—then I haven’t used the ad hominem. I’ve just tried to persuade him. What did you mean, exactly?
I feel like people’s defense of Byrne used to be “he’s just applying a philosophy of language position to a narrow question about the referent of woman”. This seems really beyond the scope of that skillset.
News Break: Supreme Court grants Trump emergency request to implement ban on trans people serving in the military – a ban that had been under a nationwide injunction. Recall that the EO regards trans people (well, trans women) as incapabable of exemplifying “a soldier’s commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle. I just thought it was worth noting that while we discuss these matters, the Trump attack on trans people continues. To take Byrne’s contribution outside of this context as a sort of “stand alone’ thing makes no sense at all to me.
Not exactly. The court stayed a preliminary injunction pending consideration of the merits. So the Administration can enforce the ban for now because the injunction is stayed, the court has not made a decision on the merits. The case has expedited briefing I believe.
I never claimed that SCOTUS had made a decision based on the merits. I just said they had granted the emergency request.
But that does suggest a likelihood of success on the merits [which is a condition for an injunction]. It seems Shilling may permit a large ambit of deference on the basis of national security, even if resolved under heightened scrutiny.
And this, even if Skrmetti is decided the other way [decision forthcoming].
Trump is a cruel heartless SOB who likes to use culture war issues to distract from the constitutional, corruption, and economic policy issues he is enacting. It is hard to not fall for it but we need to keep it in mind.
In spite of that, it is important to analyse the issues for what they are. Here with the supreme court the issue is whether the president has the authority to set admission policy for the military and whether there may be constitutional issues that should restrain him. This is very different from the issue of the evidence or lack thereof for treating minors identifying as trans, which is a medical evidence issue. They are related only in that they put a limit potentially on the agenda regarding trans that had seemed to have gained momentum over the past decade. The details however are important.
In addition to the issue of the authority of the president to set admissions standars, and the evidence for gender affirming care for minors, is one not often discussed, namely the question of whether gender dysphoria is a health issue at all. The tension that confuses me here is that the argument for gender affirming care and medical intervention in children is that these are illness/health issues. Gender dysphoria is argued to be a mental illness that can be treated by aligning the persons expressed gender with their identified gender. We should allow for and health insurance should pay for it because otherwise the health issue would cause suffering. This is on the face of it connected with the justification for the Trump ban on admission, ie. trans people are ill and unstable [I am not here arguing for this but just pointing out the confusion]
Putting aside entirely the specifics of this case, I want to push back a bit against one of Justin’s general points in this post. He says, “The anti-expertise and anti-education agenda of the Trump administration makes it surprising that any academic would agree to work for it.”
I certainly respect anyone’s decision not to work for this (or any) government. But I don’t think the nation would be well served by mass refusal. An illustration from a slightly different area: the lawlessness of the Trump administration is at least as much of an affront to lawyers as its anti-intellectualism is to academics, and a number of government lawyers have quite properly resigned rather than carry out illegal or otherwise inappropriate orders, but it is good that we have not seen mass resignations from the DOJ. The government does many important things, and if people with expertise and integrity refuse to do them, they will either go undone or be done by the inexpert and the unprincipled.
I don’t think it is easy to decide whether to work with a government like this. But Trump 1.0 said many awful things but did much less concrete harm than Trump 2.0 is already doing, and one very obvious reason is that 1.0 was mostly staffed by fairly mainstream and competent people, whereas 2.0 has fewer establishment people and more true believers. I am less than confident that it would be good to accelerate this trend.
There’s a salient and important difference, though, between working with a government to promote its agenda and working with a government to ameliorate its agenda. I suppose by “work for” Justin might have meant the former (cf. his response to Bogardus).
Isn’t that just the general principle that you shouldn’t work for a government (or, really, do anything) if the direct effect of what you do is harmful? That’s pretty different from the principle that you shouldn’t work with a government because of general features of that government.
I don’t think it is necessarily consequentialist like that. The general features of the government could affect, for instance, what one’s duties are when working for the government.
I think there’s a slightly broader principle – if a government is doing a lot of harmful things, you should be extra careful about being asked to participate in some new thing that this government is doing, and try to ensure that your participation will do more to mitigate these harms than to exacerbate them. If you can’t tell what the effects of your participation will be, there is still some broader evidence based on the effects of the other novel initiatives of this government, and you can’t always presume good faith.
That’s reasonable.
I see I somehow missed a comment from ‘On the Market Too’, making broadly the same point; apologies.
Re your reference to resignations from DOJ: My understanding from reading press accounts (WaPo mostly) is that there have in fact been large-scale resignations from parts of DOJ, e.g. the Civil Rights Division and the Office of the Solicitor General. The latter is relatively small, but I saw reporting to the effect that about half of its lawyers have either resigned or announced their intent to do so. Which is entirely understandable, though I suppose it would be desirable if at least a few competent people remained somewhere at DOJ.
Just want to thank you Justin for this post. Amazing how many “philosophers” on here are trying to isolate the report from the administration’s obviously fascistic goals. Compare this to any of the posts on the Trump admin’s attacks on academia and its clear people are much less interested in abstract philosophizing when the gun is pointed towards them.
As for Byrne, if this is true (and it seems to me from his response that it is) MIT or any other institution interested in employing him should be held responsible. Byrne is providing justification to the impulses of an administration that has repeatedly used whatever justification it can to commit blatant atrocities. Someone at MIT should be too smart not to see that.
If I was an LGBTQ student at MIT, I would feel disgusted and betrayed by his employment. It’s one thing to have an opinion and another to jump aboard the fascist train to enforce it.
If Byrne was involved in the report, it’s clearly within the scope of his academic freedom, so it would be none of MIT’s business.
Yes.
Gaardian, you seem to be saying that we should be putting pressure on MIT to fire Byrne or sanction him in some way, were he involved in the writing of this report. I strongly disagree with this.
Byrne’s academic freedom protects this kind of activity, just as it protects our criticism of it.
Further, academics should have this freedom. I’m not going to take the time now to rehearse the familiar arguments for this last claim. I just want to advise we not go down the path you’re suggesting.
I find it concerning how much this discussion is attacking someone without any real evidence of wrong doing or malfeasance. We have no idea if he was involved at all really. We have no idea if he was whether it was to comment on a draft or whether his whole involvement was handing them his bibliography from his own research as a starting point for theirs. The assumption that he had any real role in its writing or had any authority in shaping its conclusions is simply empty. And unfair. It seems people do not like his earlier book and are using the current report as an excuse to throw around more shade and hate
But how could that be, Leslie, when as everyone knows, we are living in a time when any viewpoint on any issue can be argued for with no professional repercussions: in other words, as we all know and keep hearing, the motivation behind the _Journal for Controversial Ideas_ is an utter myth, since the philosophical community is as committed as ever to fair, free, and open discussions, particularly on these topics.
That’s why we can be so sure that this report, and anyone who might contribute to it, is evil. If there were any compelling evidence at all that the ‘affirmative care’ approach for minors were in any way deficient, that evidence would have already been considered fairly and objectively by this and other academic communities, and we would all have heard about it by now. The fact that we have not heard of it through the usual channels shows that it cannot possibly exist. Hence, we can and must dismiss anyone who raises doubts about that approach as hateful.
Also, remember that if people have done anything hateful, or even if they are suspected of doing something hateful, they are not facing any ‘cancel culture’ when people scheme against them or try to nudge each other into pushing for them to be fired: such people are only facing accountability culture, which in fact keeps the discourse freer and more authoritative. ‘Cancel culture’ is another pernicious myth.
All these things being beyond question, the only reasonable thing to conclude is that this very post and conversation do not exist!
The journal of controversial ideas? Isn’t that the journal that published a paper based on someone imagining what brain sizes different races have from looking at maps produced in the 1940s and then said they only had 4 articles in their next issue because of how high their publication standards are?
I don’t know, Lewis. It seems that there was once a pair of opposing articles on a topic you are apparently trying to allude to. But I say: if Lewis Powell is capable of describing a JCI article in such negative terms, then that should be sufficient not only to dismiss the entire journal in which they appeared from any serious consideration, but also the entire motivation for the journal in the first place.
The only plausible thing to draw from your comment, given the high epistemic standards and intellectual responsibility shown by everyone in this long discussion thread about Byrne’s name showing up in some meta-data, is that Peter Singer and Jeff McMahan, eminent ethicists with a consistently progressive orientation, must somehow have become confused along the way by a mirage that led them to think that a Journal for Controversial Ideas was necessary. How silly of them, when the community of academic philosophers already fairly considers all the viewpoints that are worth considering, and never resorts to straw man tactics to dismiss, say, entire journals, and certainly never engages in witch hunts over someone’s name appearing without context in the meta-data of a report that reaches a conclusion that is greatly disliked (even though few if any people condemning it even seem familiar with the case in support of it, and even though the witch hunters seem to have a very hard time distinguishing the case the report makes from other cases it makes them think of).
I don’t think I mentioned mirages, fwiw.
I will say that I have not read the HHS report and I do not plan to. The conclusion of the report was specified in advance by executive order, and so, it seems fairly clear to me that it is not a scholarly endeavor, no matter how successfully it may have been crafted to look like one. It doesn’t matter if I like the conclusion or not. If the president orders people to write up a report saying WPATH guidelines are bad, and we should stop permitting youth gender transition, and then people do write up such a report, there is no academic or intellectual value in investigating the report they write up. The conclusion was decided in advance, the people assembling the report, eo ipso, did not do a fair survey of the available data and present their findings, they assembled a report that followed that order.
It is disappointing to me that philosophers in these comments who are familiar with the difference between science and pseudo-science seem so keen to ignore that difference and debate the merits of a report that, irrespective of the evidence on the ground, was going to reach the conclusion it was ordered to reach.
So this is a matter of principle, and that principle is that we should not take seriously — or even read — any reports or other projects whose conclusions can be plausibly assumed to have been determined in advance, on the grounds that such things are pseudoscientific?
In all seriousness, I don’t think that’s such a bad principle. But if that’s the principle you want to follow, we’re going to have to throw far more than that into the garbage, maybe without even reading it.
For example: not only will we have to discard anything written on youth gender medicine by or for people who may plausibly be suspected of hoping that the conclusion comes out one way, but we’ll also have to discard anything written on the same subject by, or for, any person or group that plausibly seems to want the result to go the other way. As far as I can see, that would eliminate something above 90% of what everyone here seems to rely on, if not much more.
That’s not to say that it’s impossible to create a suitably neutral space to explore these questions. It’s just that we’re not remotely close to that now.
Also, what about all the reports written about diversity, equity and inclusion matters, for bodies that seem to have already concluded in advance of the writing of the report that systemic racism, the patriarchy, misogyny, and so on are rampant? Do we also have to go back and throw all those things out, and mentally ignore those comments in retrospect, as juries are asked to try to do?
I’m not saying that none of those things exists. But by the principle you’ve just articulated, even if they do exist, we must all dismiss all reports that presumed their truth as pseudoscientific.
I find it interesting that you fabricated a wildly different principle than what I stated, and then attempted to use that principle against me.
But I’m glad that you do agree with me that this HHS report is pseudoscience.
I’d be curious to hear what your principle is, then — assuming, for the sake of charity, that you are acting out of principle rather than partisanship.
As for what I said: either all violations are the principle should be dismissed as pseudoscientific, or else they should not be dismissed for violating the principle; but I never agreed with your selective application of the rule. If you’re not careful to get that right, then I don’t see much point in continuing the discussion.
Since what we wrote to each other is short and very easy for anyone to review and compare with what you said and what I said about it, I’ll leave this as a matter for those who care to check for themselves.
My principle is that if the government orders people to produce a scientific report with a specific conclusion, and they follow those orders, it’s not science, irrespective of what data/support they put in the report.
So then that invalidates all reports generated by any Democratic administration, too, if they support conclusions in line with Democrats’ values and aims?
Perhaps you will use ‘orders to’ to do the heavy lifting. But then why think that those who contributed to this report were ordered to do so in a way that scientists and other researchers who contributed to reports under Democratic leaders did not?
And what special evidence do you have that, in this case and no similar cases under Democratic Presidents, the conclusion was insisted on in advance?
As I have specified in a few other comments on this thread, there is a literal executive order, posted on the white house’s page of presidential actions, which has the content I am describing?
Sections 3 and 4 (see attached image) are particularly relevant to my claim here:
Here is an executive order from Biden that requests the production of a report; it is the first one that came up when I searched a list of Biden’s EOs, and it strikes me as relevantly different from the Trump executive order. Maybe you think it is not, and if so, feel free to explain how I am being hypocritical or inconsistent, but I don’t think the two are of a piece (this does not mean I think there is nothing noteworthy about the fact that the government is ordering the report in the second case, just that there are some major significant differences between the Trump EO and this random Biden one I found).
Hi, Lewis. Sorry not to have replied earlier: it’s been an insanely busy few days.
I must say first of all that I really appreciate your making an effort to articulate the principle you think we should follow here: I’m often frustrated by how evasive trained philosophers can be when pushed on these issues in this and other forums. I’m grateful to you for taking the time to think it over and set this out.
I’m still puzzled by exactly what the principle is, though. You’ve provided an executive order by Joe Biden for us to consider alongside the Donald Trump executive order. But could you please say what you find to be the distinctive difference between them?
Is it something about the executive orders themselves? Or is it their conclusion?
The Trump one does, as you say, suggest that Trump presumed that the gender-affirming approach is often a hurtful approach to take for minors, while the Biden one seems to presume that medicine and medical research are biased against women. Is your idea that we have good initial grounds to accept Biden’s presumption and good initial grounds to reject Trump’s presumption? Is that it? Or something else?
I encourage you to read my exchange with Simon, and see if it sheds any light on things for you.
I did read it, but I’m still in the dark, I’m afraid.
First of all: I entirely agree with what you say to him about a murder trial. The whole point of these sorts of inquiries, as you suggest, is to allow us to reach a fair and objective verdict. If someone’s thumb is allowed to rest on the scale, it either gives us some reason to take the results with a grain of salt, or else gives us a reason to treat the process as so illegitimate that the best we can do is to ignore the results entirely.
On that, it seems, we agree. But consider the case you present for a contrast: at the start of Joe Biden’s executive order, he says: “For far too long, scientific and biomedical research excluded women and undervalued the study of women’s health. The resulting research gaps mean that we know far too little about women’s health across women’s lifespans, and those gaps are even more prominent for women of color, older women, and women with disabilities.”
Now, a number of people have raised doubts about this general picture: they point out that women live significantly longer than men in modern societies due to the advances in medicine, and that more money is spent researching women’s health than men’s health, (compare the money invested in researching breast cancer vs. prostate cancer, etc.) but that we continue to hear a narrative that the exact opposite is the case; and that if the health outcomes had been the reverse of what they in fact are, the disparity in life expectancies, etc., would have been an ongoing cause for complaint and accusations of systemic bias, and so on.
I don’t know what to think of all that. Perhaps there’s a decisive answer to those concerns, and Joe Biden was, in the final analysis right to present things this way, and to direct even more funding and other research incentive to women’s health, disproportionately. I don’t know.
But even if Biden’s presupposition that research into women’s health is comparatively lacking due to the systemic neglect of women’s concerns is true, and even if Trump’s presupposition that gender-affirming care is medically suboptimal is false, the fact remains that both of these executive orders presume things that many find questionable.
For instance, if some medical researcher had disagreed with Biden and his supporters and had wanted to say that it is men’s health issues, and not women’s, that should be the focus of research, can’t we presume that such a person would thereby not have been invited to contribute to the report that Biden had presented in line with his executive order?
And if so, why wouldn’t that count as another presidential thumb on the scale, invalidating the research and making it pseudoscience, on your view?
That’s what I don’t yet see.
Justin,
My principle concerns the situation:
President orders [group X] to produce a report on whether [P], and requires that it must conclude that [P].
Anything that doesn’t fit that schema isn’t germane to my position.
The Trump E.O. fits this schema because it orders HHS to produce a report on whether WPATH’s guidance on youth gender care is incorrect and stipulates that it must come to that conclusion.
Since neither report requested in the Biden E.O. is a report investigating the truth of thing you’ve suggested as being stipulated/presupposed by the E.O., it simply cannot be an instance of the schema. To save you the trouble of clicking to see what reports were actually requested: One is a report from the NIH documenting how they have complied with the executive order (and you could suggest that there is something objectionable about the other bits of the order they are being told to comply with, but it wouldn’t be the same thing I’ve said is a problem with the Trump E.O.) The other is a report from the OMB (and some other political advisors) on what budgetary, policy and regulatory approaches would best support the stated agenda of the Executive Order. Again, the latter report is not investigating the truth of
And while the people composing the reports may need to take it for granted in their work, that the above is true, their work is literally producing policy and budget recommendations for a political administration, not producing a putatively objective scientific report on the consensus/state of the field.
Again, I picked that Biden E.O. by clicking the first one that came up in a search, so maybe there is one that is better for your case if you do some searching. I don’t know.
Leslie, you write: “The Trump E.O. fits this schema because it orders HHS to produce a report on whether WPATH’s guidance on youth gender care is incorrect and stipulates that it must come to that conclusion.”
I see. But imagine that, in 2029, some Democratic President enters the White House, and that that candidate believes that the gender-affirming care model is the best and also that any other model is junk science. This new President immediately issues an Executive Order rescinding Trump’s E.O.s on the subject, and simultaneously calls for researchers and other academics to prepare a report on the true state of youth gender medicine. Anyone would be able to see, just as anyone can see now, that the President who issued such an order would expect the report to come out with a certain result.
According to what you say now, that hypothetical future report would also be pseudoscience for the same reason you say this one is, and any researcher who contributed to it would be guilty of pseudoscientific practices for having anything to do with that report.
Have I understood correctly?
No, you have not. You also got my name wrong, and had to make up future hypothetical executive orders to attempt to generate your “both-sides”-ing, so I think you may be more concerned with trying to generate a “gotcha” than with trying to carefully read what I’ve written and understand what I’m saying which would be somewhat acceptable if you were able to actually do so.
Sorry to have written ‘Leslie’ by accident: it’s been a long day.
I am not at all trying to generate a ‘gotcha’: I’ve been doing my best to see how, if at all, anyone could avoid a serious problem while following a consistent principle of the sort you espouse. It seems to me that, on any consistent reading of the principle you feel we should espouse, you are going to have to either take back your condemnation of Byrne or else condemn far too many people, including anyone who might participate in the reversing of Trump’s Executive Order on some future President (for example).
You may call that ‘making up future hypothetical executive orders to attempt to generate ‘my’ “both sides”-ing’, but to most of us philosophers, this is standard practice when someone proposes a principle that seems dubious: we check it by seeing how it would do in hypothetical cases that put it to the test. When we do that, yours seems to get the wrong answers even by your own lights. That’s why I think the principle should be rejected, and that’s why I think you have no good grounds for condemning Byrne.
I am not the only person in this sub-thread who feels that your principle will not work. Daniel Greco agrees with me that your principle will end up being too dismissive. Leslie Glazer agrees with me that your principle depends too much on easy access to a science/pseudoscience distinction that it will not be easy to maintain, which is closely related to the point I have been pressing.
If you don’t want to consider revising your principle against these apparent difficulties, or justify your verdict that they are not real difficulties, that’s your business. I’ve done what I could to give you a chance to explain how your principle can avoid what seem to me to be very serious problems. But, as you suggest in your own criticism, there’s not much one can do against someone who has apparently decided in advance what the conclusion is meant to be, and is only giving the appearance of being interested in fair inquiry.
Justin,
I have been very clear and explicit about the principle I am endorsing, and you have struggled quite a bit to limit yourself to considering cases that fit the principle. I even took the additional step of rendering it somewhat formally so you could see what is required for something to qualify as an instance of the principle I articulated, and whether a case will meet that condition. I think that if you go back and look at my earlier statements, in this sub-thread and others, you may be surprised to notice that they are all statements of that same principle.
You didn’t acknowledge that you misunderstood or misstated the principle in any of your prior comments, nor did you acknowledge that I’ve been consistent in my statement of it. And even your thought experiment of a future Democratic violation of it fails to fit the form of the principle.
Now, part of the reason that it doesn’t fit the schema is because the schema just includes ordering them to produce a particular conclusion and you just made that implicit rather than an order, so that’s sloppy on your part; since I gave you the recipe for the principle and you ignored it.
The other issue, though is that someone whose stated goal is honest scientific inquiry might come in next, and they might rescind trump’s EO, and then ask for a clean report to be issued (much like a police chief coming in and throwing out the report that was the product of the prior chief saying “make the investigation blames that guy” and says “we’re going to throw the old report out and re-investigate things” and if that chief doesn’t tell the detectives what specific result to pursue, they might find the same guy responsible, they might find a different person, they might not find a consensus on the perpetrator, etc.).
Now, if the next person comes in and says “write me an HHS review that says WPATH is the consensus best approach”, I would think that is, in fact, a bad way to learn what the consensus is. Because it is, as noted, only a good way to learn that the people involved followed the instructions from the president.
As you noted, Daniel Greco had a point about whether we could learn anything from the report written in these conditions, and I did concede to Greco that there is some way to indirectly learn things about the state of the evidence from looking at the report, but that this is difficult, because (as I noted to Simon) we have to be in a position to figure out what kind of job was done at complying with the boss’s directive, and that might involve knowledge we don’t have about the state of the field, so in many cases, we are better off disregarding a known-corrupt report, because it will distort our perception and we aren’t well situated to correct the distortions.
(And I would apply this in both directions, but it would need to genuinely be an instance of my principle, which, for some reason, you are basically incapable of producing)
Lewis,
I know you think I’m doing that, but please take another look at the Trump Executive Order that you yourself provided as evidence.
Section 3 (from your copy) begins with a claim that the WPATH guidelines are lacking in scientific integrity.
But Section 3 (a) (ii), again in the very passage you presented, reads,
“(ii) within 90 days of the date of this order, the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) shall publish a review of the existing literature on best practices for promoting the health of children who assert gender dysphoria, rapid-onset gender dysphoria, or other identity-based confusion.”
That is, as far as I can see, the only part that calls for this report to be written. And yet, it does not explicitly say that the review should take the position that the gender-affirming approach is not always best.
You see? Here’s what you just said to me right now: “the schema just includes ordering them to produce a particular conclusion and you just made that implicit rather than an order, so that’s sloppy on your part; since I gave you the recipe for the principle and you ignored it.” And yet, it was implicit in your original as well! I was just reflecting the form of the original.
This is no small point, Lewis. The basis of your condemnation of Byrne depends on your claim that he is guilty of pseudoscience on the grounds that he (let us continue to speculate) contributed to a report whose conclusion was _explicitly commanded_ by the President, and _not_ merely implied. That’s the distinction you just berated me for allegedly not having noticed. And yet, that does not seem to square at all with the order itself, as you yourself posted it!
Please quote me a place in these comments where I comdemn Byrne
Well, you did say, “It’s not politically silly to refuse to participate in the production of propaganda for your political opponents.
It is not academically silly to refuse to deploy your putative academic expertise and reputation for a project that has a pre-arranged conclusion stipulated by executive fiat, and which will be the conclusion of the report, irrespective of the evidence on the ground (in fact, that is what makes the report propaganda, rather than science).
The idea that participating in making this report would provide access to power, rather than making one a tool of this administration’s goals is laughable.”
Since the topic of this thread is Byrne’s alleged contribution to this report, doesn’t it seem that you are referring to the actions of Byrne (if he was involved)?
Who else’s “putative academic expertise and reputation” are you referring to? Who else are you suggesting throw away that expertise and reputation, with the result that he has become a tool of this administration’s goals?
Also: I just responded to the point you say condemns Byrne (or whichever researchers helped produce this report, but this thread is about Byrne). I pointed out that your whole grounds for singling out the contributor to this report — the distinction between writing a report whose conclusion a President has explicitly ordered in advance and a report whose conclusion can only be implied — is belied by the very quote you provided from the Executive Order. And yet you have not withdrawn your condemnation, nor have you replied to this key point.
This will be my last comment in this thread (replying to you, at any rate). There is a difference between my disparaging the report and my condemning Byrne, and I have done the former (repeatedly and with gusto) and I have suggested that anyone who participated in the report ought to be ashamed of themselves, and whoever that turns out to be will have to deal with my harsh but non-targeted rebuke if they care about my judgment.
But you weren’t able to find me saying that Byrne in particular is one of those people as I was careful not to condemn him on the basis of this meta-data and a strangely oblique denial, and so, it would be minimally decent of you to retract your claim that I condemned Byrne, rather than engage in a mealy mouthed defense of your assertion. But if you want to let it stand or further defend yourself, so be it.
Very well, Lewis. I hereby withdraw my claim that you condemned Byrne in particular. I spoke wrongly in assuming that you intended him as your target, rather than the-person-or-persons-who-contributed-to-this-report, whom many have been presuming was Byrne. I stand corrected on that point.
In turn, it would be minimally decent of you if you would admit at long last that — as I’ve demonstrated a couple of times now — it is you and not I who has muddled the difference between Trump’s explicitly ordering the writers of the report to come up with a certain conclusion (which it seems he did not do), and his implicitly tipping the scales in paragraphs surrounding his call for the report to be made (which he did do).
Again, this was a crucial point for your own statement of the principle you claim to be following here — after, that is, I was able to persuade you to state the principle — and hence the crux of your whole case against the as-yet unknown person or persons who contributed to the report. And yet, rather than admit that you goofed and that your case seems to have collapsed on your own terms, you kept insisting for some time that I was the one who was getting this wrong.
I’m not holding my breath on that one, though. As soon as I quoted the very same passage back to you that you relied upon in making your attempted distinction, you feel silent (after going on the attack once more against me), and, now that there is nothing more you could possibly say on the matter other than “I got it wrong, sorry”, you instead announce that you will not contribute further to the discussion. Convenient!
Well, let the record show that I at least have acknowledged that you did not name Byrne in particular, as you asked me to acknowledge. Take care.
I agree that if the president subsequent to Trump were to issue an executive order that were the same as this one, but it favored my political views instead of being against them, I would similarly think the report that resulted was not good science. I deny that you described such a case as that, or that you have a clear appreciation of the difference between “knowing what someone’s view on a topic is” and “the person has ordered you to produce a report that conforms to their views”
Well, since I just showed you that this is at best a case of knowing what someone’s view on a topic is and not a case in which (as far as you have shown) anyone was explicitly ordered to produce a report that conforms to his views, and since you are continuing on in this vein without acknowledging or otherwise responding to that anyway, it presumably occurs to careful readers here that I’m not the one having a hard time distinguishing those two things.
Addendum to what I just wrote: this is not just some abstract philosophical discussion. The conduct of a member of the profession has been called into question in public here. I am opposed to that practice in general: If there are reasonable grounds for thinking that Byrne (or anyone else in other cases) acted wrongly, then the case against him should be assessed by some properly-designated, objective body, under appropriate conditions of confidentiality. It strikes me as indefensibly careless, malicious and trashy for most of these cases to be aired and discussed in public in the first place. It strikes me as a cheap way of turning what is in serious cases is the worst moment of one’s career or life — and in other cases, like this one, is laughably petty and speculative — into cheap clickbait, providing an crass, hurtful entertainment for some and a platform for moral grandstanding for many others. There is no call for this, and it is a black eye on the profession that we allow it to happen in the first place. If there were some legitimate philosophical interest in discussing the rights and wrongs of these cases, they could (and should!) be done with hypothetical scenarios, not with the accused person’s reputation hanging in the balance. But of course, that would not generate nearly as many clicks. Gossip sells, after all, the reasoning seems to go, so why not profit from the exploitation of other colleagues’ misery — and if there is no misery to be found, why not create it for the entertainment of others?
We should all have called for it to be shut down long ago. But, to the shame of the profession, it continues. And so here we are again, over a decade after all this tabloid journalism started on the blogs, by my count.
So long as this rot persists, we need to ask ourselves: What would we wish our colleagues to do if _we_ were the one in the stocks?
I daresay that, if we could not wish (as I do) that the stocks be abolished as an inhumane form of punishment — especially before any sort of legitimate finding, but even after — we would wish that the colleagues who participate in these public condemnations would take great care not to overstep in their condemnations, or if they could not restrain themselves, that they would at least be restrained by others.
I have never once joined in any of these disgusting public conversations to condemn the person in the stocks, but I have tried, as consistently as I could, to call the thing off or at least to bring some much-neglected doubt to the proceedings. And, of course, those of us who have done so have been pelted for our interventions by some of the rotten food the spectators have brought to pelt the accused with.
There is a person’s reputation at stake here. You may continue to scoff at me as you like, but it could happen one day that you find _yourself_ in the stocks. Whom would you rather have standing by then? Someone like me? Or someone like you?
I’ve been quietly reading along here, but I found this addendum rather enlightening and wanted to say something.
You seem to be afraid of being morally judged by your peers. So much so that you’d prefer to ban public moral judgment outright. And you seem to think that everybody should share your fear and your reaction to it. But that’s not the case.
Taking a stand for what one thinks is right always opens one up to the disapproval of one’s peers. Taking away the space for such disapproval is itself deeply illiberal, it offends against the teachings of On Liberty.
Finally, for what it’s worth, your moral concern seems to be misplaced. You are worried about someone’s “reputation” being at stake and are speaking up. I and others are worried about trans people’s freedom, access to healthcare, and ability to participate in society. These are higher moral stakes than mere reputation among philosophers and yet you don’t speak up.
Reputation is always implicit among the community of scholars. Sites like DailyNous just make this implicit process more democratic by having more information available to more people. This is a vast improvement over reputation (and the optional offices it entails, mostly invitations to things) being conferred by a small cabal in the upper echelons of the profession. Or some “body” — preposterous.
I suppose that threats to reputation seem more urgent to you because you can fathom such a threat to yourself. But your freedom and healthcare is not realistically threatened. I suggest broadening your mind a little bit.
The reason I have always been concerned by these smear campaigns is not because I fear that I, too, will be smeared one day. If that had been my fear, then I would have chosen to keep silent or write under a pseudonym, clearly. Why would I provoke the very thing I most fear when I could easily avoid it?
Instead, the reason is that I see this way of carrying on as unjust in any community, and utterly destructive to the purposes of academic inquiry.
It is not a matter of one threat as opposed to another, or one freedom as opposed to another. I may not be transgender myself, but I have stood up for transgender people long before long ago, before they had such support. And if you or anyone else were being treated unfairly and had nobody to stand up for you, you could count on me to come to your defense when it might be unpopular for me to do so, just as I am defending Byrne here.
Yeah, I’m sure you believe what you’re saying but I don’t.
You use a subjunctive (“_were_ being treated unfairly”) to describe the injustices done to queer people.
And you seem to think the “injustice” of being called out for unjust actions is more worthy of your intervention than the actions themselves.
Well, I can’t do much about what you happen to believe about my motivations, I suspect, especially since your previous speculation about them was so uncharitable as to be utterly nonsensical: you speculated that I have a tendency to speak up about people being unfairly publicly targeted in order that I might make things better for myself if and when I become unfairly publicly targeted, while in fact the only reason I am likely to be targeted at all is that I have spoken up about it in the first place!
Still, let me be clearer:
I have focused on other people — not me, despite what you persist in saying — being called out unreasonably, because
That does not at all entail, and I do not at all believe, anything about the comparative badness of other things.
Speaking in the active voice this time to make sure that I cannot fairly be misunderstood: If you personally _are_, now or in the future, discriminated against merely for being queer — if people try to drum you out of your job or deny you a promotion or a place to live, etc., merely because of your being queer — and if few or no other people are willing to speak out against that and stand with you, then look me up (I’m not hard to track down) and you’ll see for yourself that I’ll be glad to speak up for you, too. This isn’t a zero-sum game.
“If you personally _are_, now or in the future, discriminated against merely for being queer — if people try to drum you out of your job or deny you a promotion or a place to live, etc., merely because of your being queer”
Well good — because I am. Some people think that my mere being myself is “gay propaganda” and I should therefore be prohibited from teaching (which is my job). They have not yet tried to get me *individually* fired but they have attempted the same with others like me.
I’m one disgruntled student with a largeish Twitter account away from that. And unlike the various *phobes who oh so fear “cancellation”, I can’t simply keep my mouth shut because it’s pretty obvious what I am without me saying so (I generally don’t).
Byrne is apparently teamed up with these people and furthering their agenda. Can I count on your support?
“That does not at all entail, and I do not at all believe, anything about the comparative badness of other things.”
Let me turn your game with Lewis back at you: what is *your* principle?
Supposedly you agree that sometimes an injustice needs to be called out. (You’re doing it yourself here.)
How do you decide whether to join those who do the calling out vs. admonish them? Without making a judgement about what is the greater (if at all) injustice?
I’m very sorry to hear your story that people are trying to get you fired. If I heard or saw anyone say that it’s ‘propaganda’ to allow someone to keep teaching merely because of that person’s sexual orientation, you can bet that I would say something about it. And again, if you can show me that this is happening and give me an opportunity to speak against it, I’d be glad to, especially if others are letting you down.
But if you’re asking me to gang up against Byrne (or whoever it is) merely because the person in question raised some critical concerns about youth gender medicine and that leads you to diagnose whoever it is as having some ‘phobia’, well, I never offered to allow you to dictate to me what counts as an injustice or to jump on your bandwagon. You may be convinced that there’s some causal connection between those two things; but as far as I can see, the researchers who have suggested that youth gender medicine should be approached with more caution are not obviously engaging in bullying here. They may be right, and they may be wrong — I don’t know. But I didn’t see anything in that report calling for queer professors or teachers or anyone else to be fired from their jobs, and I don’t like being pressured into aggressive campaigns against colleagues.
Again, sorry to hear about the people you say are trying to get you fired for your sexual orientation: glad to help with that if you send me the details.
Justin, seriously. Google “teacher fired lgbt” or something like this, and you’ll find many cases. Not me personally, but many others.
If you’re only willing to stand up for individual cases that already happened, but not against a broader agenda that generates these cases, then your support is frankly useless.
You know, you can just say that you think that Byrne’s actions are permissible and you therefore oppose scolding him. I’d judge you for it, but it would be a lot more honest than this hemming and hawing.
“Taking a stand for what one thinks is right always opens one up to the disapproval of one’s peers. Taking away the space for such disapproval is itself deeply illiberal, it offends against the teachings of On Liberty.”
Sure thing. But, as far as I have been reading this discussion I am not seeing a lot of discussion of the ideas themselves but more a disapproval on the one hand ad hominem of Byrne for associating himself with a fascist and fascist agenda, and on the other hand trashing him without even knowing if and in what way he even had been involved with the report. The unfairness of this should be transparent
” You are worried about someone’s “reputation” being at stake and are speaking up. I and others are worried about trans people’s freedom, access to healthcare, and ability to participate in society. These are higher moral stakes than mere reputation among philosophers and yet you don’t speak up.”
All these things can be debated and discussed for sure. But, the context is more narrow, i.e. this particular report. And this report is not in any obvious way about “trans people’s freedom, access to healthcare, and ability to participate in society,” but is about whether a certain form of health care for minors is appropriate or harmful. This isn’t about whether trans persons exist or whether they have a right to life, liberty, and to pursue happiness as they choose in our society. If one thinks the report does imply that or thinks Byrne is arguing for that then one needs to demonstrate this
The arguments are often too simplified for politics sake. I probably might offend some here by saying this, but one can believe that a trans person has the right to live their lives as fully as possible as they choose without fear of violence or prejudice while also not believing that minors have the capacity and maturity to make decisions about medical interventions however they feel, or also believing that adults who intervene in certain ‘gender affirming’ ways are doing more harm than good, however well meaning their intentions.
The lack of ability to discuss openly and debate honestly is the problem. What seems needed is actually honest reviews of the medical, psychological, and social effects of various approaches to the phenomenon of gender dysphoria in children without the hysteria
Moral disapprobation for contributing to a fascist agenda isn’t an ad hominem.
Too much here hangs on the meaning of ‘pseudo-science’. I agree that this report was directed by the trumpistas who have a agenda and wanted a certain conclusion. That in and of itself doesn’t entail that the study and report is itself not a good one, unless we assume— and this of course is quite plausible— that everyone involved have no scientific or intellectual integrity. To determine how good or serious the report those who are familiar withthe literature would have to read it critically and with their own honesty and integrtity. Thats how actual science is supposed to work. Most science, in contrast with your assumption, works where the researcher does start out with theories and hypotheses how they think the research results will look in the end. Good science however, sets things up so that they can be corrected and challenged by what they find, and put things out in the broader community of researchers to illuminate where the research falls short. Skipping over this process is what is pseudo science. And, as jusin Kalef has pointed out, both sides of this issue can be accused of this effort to ignore the debate
In fairness, this is one reason it’s unfortunate that the authors aren’t (currently) public.
I don’t know why people are so attracted to the false equivalence here that because you can suspect the motives of people on various sides of a debate we should treat everyone the same as a case where the president of the country orders the health department to produce a report with a specific conclusion and then it does produce a report with that conclusion. That’s obviously a different case from “one scientist is biased in their views about, say, fracking before conducting their analysis of the data.”
Obviously there can be cases of pseudoscience in multiple directions and they don’t all involve political represssion of dissenting views but it’s super weird for folks here to carry this much water for a report literally produced by following a political directive. It’s just not how science is done.
When you know somebody was going to argue for a particular conclusion regardless of what evidence and facts they uncovered in their inquiry, the fact that they came to that conclusion shouldn’t itself carry any weight. On that, I agree.
It doesn’t follow from that that we can’t learn anything about the subject matter by reading a report with a preordained conclusion. I think a lot of partisan hackery is like this. You know the partisan hack will argue for P. Given his hackery, defending P is the only option. But he’s going to do his homework, and if there are genuinely good reasons to believe P, he’ll find those and present them. If there aren’t, he’ll use obfuscation, misdirection, bullshitting, etc.
So to the extent that you can distinguish between good arguments and obfuscation–no guarantee, as it will often be hard to tell, especially if you’re not knowledgable about the subject matter–it can be informative to see what sorts of report a partisan hack produced. E.g., if you know about the arguments on the other side, then you can see whether they squarely address them, or avoid doing so. The fact that their conclusion itself is pre-ordained doesn’t prevent the report from telling you stuff. Even if they conclude P, if you see they avoided the best arguments against P, you should become a bit more confident that P is false, because you should become more confident that those arguments don’t have convincing replies (after all, if they did, the partisan hacks would’ve presented them).
I agree that documents produced under such conditions can provide a sort of second order evidence when viewed under the lens you describe, but I think this requires they be viewed with an explicit degree of skepticism that many people here are not deploying when talking about examining the work. For example, this comment and this comment (and the associated threads) are just two of several that seem to focus on evaluating portions or the totality of the report on their own terms, without the (seemingly important) context of it being produced persuant to an order to achieve a particular result. Call it a version of observation selection effect if you like for the people reading the report.
It is worth noting that this pushback for increased precision about how to classify the report’s evidentiary value is focused on my claim that the report is not a scientific work, and not worth reading, rather than to the people who (from your perspective) are treating it with too much credulity. I suspect this is because I am being very bold/strident in how I state my stance, so my divergence from your position is striking and clear, and maybe there’s a sort of Aristotelian “which vice is least like the virtue” test that you think my mistake is more worthy of correction, but I contend that overlooking the potential to puff up bad evidence at the margins, ignore/fail to seek out challenges to the evidence in the report, and to quietly omit evidence in favor of the views that were ordered to be ignored is the greater epistemic vice in this case.
Hi Lewis,
In response to this: “My principle is that if the government orders people to produce a scientific report with a specific conclusion, and they follow those orders, it’s not science, irrespective of what data/support they put in the report.”
That is a nicely clear and succinct statement of principle, which is relatively rare in a philosophy blog context in my experience. I think I am extremely unlikely to change your mind about it, but if for nothing other than anthropological interest about a fellow human, here is how I understand what you’re saying and why I am not convinced:
I think that “if the government orders people to produce a scientific report with a specific conclusion, and they follow those orders”, or “when the president of the country orders the health department to produce a report with a specific conclusion and then it does produce a report with that conclusion”, that is a good reason to suspect and perhaps even to bet that the report is ‘pseudoscience’, i.e., inaccurate, misleading, or poorly argued or evidenced.* I do not think, however, that the former entails the latter. Moreover, in a case like the present one, there’s a very easy way to check if the report is pseudoscientific, namely to read it and look for specific errors or inadequacies. The ground of suspicion/betting would certainly be a fine reason to do that with an especially skeptical or critical eye, but would not, as far as I can see, be a fine reason to forego doing that altogether–at least not if our ultimate goal is to know whether the report is or isn’t scientific.
Obviously this is a long lumpy thread with lots of overlapping issues being discussed at once, and I do not want to claim to have encyclopedic knowledge of every claim and counter-claim made here. So apologies if this narrow point seems to mischaracterize your view or to miss other considerations that are relevant to it.
*If by ‘pseudoscience’ or ‘pseudoscientific’ you mean something more exalted and technical than that, then I would simply say I am more interested in whether the report is inaccurate, misleading, or poorly argued or evidenced than in whether it is ‘pseudoscientific’ in some technical sense.
If you were accused of murder, lets say, and before any investigation had been done the police chief ordered the people working the case to settle on you as the perpetrator and make sure that whatever report they worked up said that you were the killer, I think we can agree that this would be a very bad approach to solving the crime.
One thing that could happen is that they could do a fake investigation and dummy up a bunch of phony evidence against you. Another thing that could happen is they could do a very obviously half-assed investigation, that doesn’t really provide any evidence against you but still blames you. A third thing they could do is look hard for evidence against you, and not look at all for evidence against anyone else or into anything you say that might exonerate you. Now this third option
could contain only true claims, and a lot of “good” detective work. You don’t have a solid alibi, you have some grudges that point to motive. Reading that report, a picture starts to emerge, it’s not a slam dunk case, but people would still come away thinking “Oof, it’s probably Simon.”
In that third case, you can go through and try to explain where all the little holes are in their investigation, but you’d have to get people to sit still for an intricate counter-narrative to the simple-ish story suggested by the report. Without anyone knowing about the chief’s order, that’s basically all you can do, though.
Imagine, though, that everyone knows that the police chief ordered them to find you responsible for the murder before any investigation had happened. And, for some reason, you still have people trying to discuss whether the report is well done or not, and how accurate it is, in isolation from the chief’s order. People want to really focus on whether the section about your motives is good, and not on the fact that the entire report is downstream of the Police Chief’s stated desire to pin this murder on you.
(Note that I haven’t said whether you committed the murder or not in this scenario, because the chief’s behavior and the quality of those reports is unacceptable, regardless of whether the chief’s hostility happened upon the correct target)
Now, personally, I think in the murder case we should probably throw the report out entirely, and re-investigate the crime, because it would be very hard to know the actual proportion of those three scenarios that went into the investigation and report, following an order like that.
Thanks for the thoughtful reply, Lewis.
Well said
I think there’s another layer that hasn’t been considered about why we might want to mistrust Byrne’s involvement (if that is confirmed). We’re assuming that there is a category of person called “philosopher” such that they should be formally recognized as having prestige or knowledge. However, the ontological status of “philosopher” seems like quite an assumption and means so many things that I’m not sure it would hold up to scrutiny! I also hear that they are sometimes a threat to students so we may not want to trust their motives, and it seems to me that there is not any established evidence as to whether they live happy, healthy, and productive lives.
Sometimes philosophers will respond that they have existed for a long time, but it doesn’t seem obvious to me because the definition is always changing and we can’t just say talking to others in Ancient Greece is the same thing as typing an “analytic” essay on your computer! I should add, it is apparent a lot of philosophy-identified professors have developed arm, neck, and back pain due to their choice to pursue such a lifestyle.
I’m hoping that after this report is finalized HHS runs another report to see if we should continue sanctioning this philosopher movement. Just to clarify, I don’t think that it should be illegal to call yourself a philosopher! I just don’t think we should socially formalize such a practice and push this self-identification on other people (and especially not on impressionable young people).
I admit that Republicans in the United States do seem to occasionally say inflammatory things about philosophers, but that doesn’t mean we should just ignore an objective review even if it suggests they should become welders instead! You couldn’t fault a proper Sociologist if they participated in the report because we need experts to collaborate with the Trump administration and make sure it doesn’t get too biased.
I know that this goes against the usual echo chamber, but I think it’s due time someone asked real questions about this recent social phenomenon.
Byrne on being a co-author.
https://archive.ph/DxBUf