Katherine Acosta, sociologist and feminist writer, and Max Dashu, lesbian feminist historian,  join Bess to discuss the Department of Education's (DOE) proposed changes to the Title IX regulation allowing sex-segregated sports teams.

You may submit a public comment on the proposed changes until May 15, 2023.

• The Department recognizes that prevention of sports-related injury is an important educational objective in recipients' athletic programs and that—as courts have long recognized in cases involving  sex-separate athletic teams—fairness in competition may be particularly important for recipients in some sports, grade and education levels, and levels of competition. citation
• DOE's directed questions
• The DOE also asks if the proposed regulation is clear enough?

An example of feminist arguments for comment is published here on Katherine's blog:

1. Female athletes may be harmed when gender identity is the overriding criteria and recipients must minimize harm to female athletes.
2. To minimize the foreseeable harms of inevitable litigation, the Department should specify which forms of proof or evidence recipients may require. 
3. Finally, the Department should recommend that recipients may [designate] one category as “open” with no sex-related proof of eligibility requirements and also maintain[] a second “female” category with sex-related female proof of eligibility other than gender identity.

Reference links and estimated time stamps

~10:35 Males have larger hearts than females; males have 10-12% greater lung capacity

~14:20 Sports participants achieve leadership roles

~14:50 Hannah Arensman retires after losing to two male racers

~17:05 Comparing male versus female athletic results

~25:50 Iszac Henig, female swimmer on male team

~26:40 Biden's Executive Order 13988

~34:40 Republicans are ready for litigation!

~40:10 Pre-pubertal children may also experience sex differences in physical capacity

Bess summarizes Nancy Whittier's analytic framework for understanding the difference between coalition (ideological congruence) and collaborative adversarial relationships, using anti-pornography feminists and Catharine MacKinnon's novel civil legislation as an example. Spoiler: MacKinnon and anti-pornography feminists were not in coalition with anti-pornography conservatives and remained in active opposition to anti-pornography conservatives' legal goals & morality-based understandings of the harms of pornography. Feminists were known to say: Sex is not obscene!

Rethinking Coalitions: Anti-Pornography Feminists, Conservatives, and Relationships between Collaborative Adversarial Movements by Nancy Whittier. See also Whittier's longer work (yes, a book) Frenemies: Feminists, Conservatives, and Sexual Violence (2018).

REFERENCES (see also previous show notes)

• Natasha Chart and Penny Nance co-author a letter published by conservative newspaper, The Federalist.
• WoLF's submission to the U.N. Independent Expert on Sexual Orientation And Gender Identity, w/advice from United Families International.
• Kara Dansky, formerly of WoLF and current leader of WDI USA, has been working w/conservatives since at least 2016.
• On the ground, Kara Dansky and conservative Natassia Grover in Loudon County at school committee hearings.
• Texas undertakes child abuse investigations of parents of transgender children.
• Texas attorney general investigating pharmaceutical companies who offer puberty blockers.
• Women's Sports Policy Working Group and Nancy Hogshead-Makar (no, my apologies, I did not pronounce her last name correctly).
• WoLF's testimony against the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.
• Natasha Chart testifying on behalf of WoLF in favor of South Dakota legislation to prohibit pediatric transition (paywall).
• Review of "educational gag orders" filed in 2021.
• Finally, Christopher Rufo is definitely not a feminist, nor a friend.

recorded 5/31/2022

In less than 25 minutes, Bess finally talks about her feminist principles and the purpose of the podcast: differentiating feminist analysis from old fashioned conservatism. 

Using the example of a popular conservative framework that describes people who adopt a transgender identity as "mentally ill," Bess explains how this understanding of transgender people and their identities is in conflict with at least three basic feminist principles:

1. Structural social critique (anti-individualism)
2. Anti-authoritarianism
3. Anti-essentialism

Feminist analysis: A Feminist Critique of Cisgender, one of Bess's favorite feminist (but not radical feminist!) essays about anti-(gender) essentialism, first published on June 8, 2012.

Conservative analysis: Alliance Defending Freedom, radical Christian nationalists who provide support to self-identified feminist organizations to spread moral panic about transgender people, are protecting "God's creative order" with "Generational Wins!" Learn more!

Gay marriage was first recognized in Massachusetts in 2004 via a beautifully written judicial decision: Goodridge v. The Dept of Public Health. We've come a long way, but it was not long ago that lesbian legal rights were just a fantasy.

Next time! No, really! Rethinking Coalitions: Anti-Pornography Feminists, Conservatives, and Relationships between Collaborative Adversarial Movements by Nancy Whittier