Self ID: the Nature of Knowledge, Phenomenology and Bodily Autonomy.
Today I want to talk about bodily autonomy. I have touched on this before (sensory pun there) here in a brief discussion about the gender-critical 'feminist' obsession with women's bodies and how we have to police ourselves in the world.
Photo credit Engine Akyurt pexels
However, I think we can go a bit deeper into this issue and go a slightly different way, the title of this piece says it all, this is about the nature of knowing who we are in our own body, and the impact it has on us when others who are not in our body attempt to control our experience in it.
What is Bodily Autonomy?
Bodily autonomy is the concept that all people have the right to determine how their body interacts with other objects and other bodies in our society and in the world.
It is their right to determine how they dress their body, what they put in it, add to it, take from it and how they use it - aka having agency. Having autonomy over our body *should* mean the right of any individual person to decide how their body feels, looks, sounds and acts in the world. However, as society puts down so many limitations and restrictions via social norms and laws which affect our ability to have autonomy and assert agency, it's fair to say we actually have a limited degree of bodily autonomy in our daily lives, and this is only heightened when you exist within a marginalised group.
And this is why bodily autonomy plays a key part in any movement fighting for equality. Whether the group is LGBTQIA+, BAME and other PoC, disabled or women, each has a core focus on bodily autonomy, because it has often been denied to them.
I have always understood bodily autonomy as a concept and a tool within sociology and philosophy which these fields use because they seek to understand, and importantly, progress, the rights of marginalised people. In my opinion, sociology itself is a tool to dismantle the inequalities and discriminations individuals and groups face within our society - which is why it's so important that we use it properly.
The Phenomenon of the Phenomena - Phenomenology
In Archaeology and Philosophy, there is an entire concept dedicated to the concept of bodily experience as individuals and individual bodily autonomy called Phenomenology .
(I can honestly tell you, I did not see myself writing about Phenomenology again outside of my dissertation after I left uni, because I never thought I would have any reason to, and yet, here we are
The very concepts of metaphysics and phenomenology fascinate me, I adore sociology and philosophy, with a wee bit of psychology in there - this is my jam people!)
Anyway...
Our body is the vehicle through which we experience the world: we live in it, we think in it, we hear in it or don't hear in it, we see in it or don't see in it, we feel or don't feel in it. Everything around us is experienced by us via our body and our brains interpretation of what that body experiences.
Every single thing you touch, every single thing you taste, every single thing thought you have, every single feeling you experience, you experience through this body, this mind and their combined interpretation of the world.
Through this body and autonomy over it, we assert agency in our lives, we are a fully autonomous, self-aware individual being, within our body, experiencing the world, in a way that only we can.
I know I'm me but how do YOU know you're YOU?
Photo credit by Tasha Kamrowski from Pexels
Gender critical 'feminism' asks trans and non-binary people to explain, in detail, how they KNOW they are who they are - 'how do you KNOW you are a woman and not a man?'.
This has always struck me as an unreasonable and one-sided demand, how can someone tell you the hows and whys of who they are? Can you tell them the hows and whys of who you are? I have said before, I could not for the life of me explain to anyone how I KNOW I am who I am, and I am a cis(gender) woman. The difference is, I am never asked to explain this, because I'm a cis woman.
But, if I was asked to explain this, I can only say I don't know what to tell you, I just know I am, same as you. And this is why I would never unreasonably demand anyone else explain this to me. If I can't explain it, why would I demand anyone else explain it?.
Our individual perceptions, interpretations and reactions to our world are our own, they are unique and they are incomparable to anyone elses.
We, as individual human beings in our own individual bodies, have literally no way to compare what it is like to be us, as opposed to being someone else. Because we have literally no frame of reference, except our own.
The entire point in the study of the body in phenomenology, in my opinion, is to attempt to understand why this is and how it works, purely because we don't understand it. So it seems rather obtuse to ask any marginalised person or group to understand and explain, spending their precious emotional labour doing so, on your whim, when you could not on theirs.
Our frame of reference is our own body and own mind working together to tell us what we experience of and in the world via our individual and unique senses and emotions in our own individual and unique body.
And we know and experience our own body
We know when something doesn't feel right, we know something does feel right. we know about our body what nobody else can know.
And that is NOT determined by having a 'male or female' body - our sex does not determine the fact that we experience things individually
That is determined by our mind and it's own experiences and interpretations of those experiences within our own body.
And this is true for EVERY human being, yes, even you, not just trans and non-binary people.
The concept of knowing who YOU are, in your own body, is something we literally all have, it's the completely unique experience only we have and only we can tell.
The only difference is that trans and non-binary people are being asked to explain it - the very same way gay men and lesbians were asked to explain it before them, the very same way Black people and other People of Colour were asked to, the very same way disabled people have been asked to.
The fact of the matter is, you exist in your own body the 'you' that is you (whatever that is, whether our mind, our soul or whatever you believe) and literally nobody can even possibly, remotely tell you otherwise - even if they believe with their whole heart that they definitely can, they literally cannot, and equally, you can't tell them who they are in theirs.
Self ID
Photo Credit Gabby K from Pexels
The only true way which is available to us to know if we really who we think we are, if we really are a man or a woman, is to just be that, to express that and tell everyone else that this is who you are, and this, my friends, is Self ID.
We, all of us, as individual beings, as individual people, as groups of people, as a collective species, Self ID Every. Single. Day. In a multitude of ways from our clothes and hairstyle to the music and tv we like. The description we give of ourselves to the world every day is our Self ID, whether we say we are a writer, or a philosopher, or a gamer, or a partier, or an animal lover, or an accountant, whicher words we use, they are all labels and all of these labels are us Self IDing.
Why do we do this? so other people can get a gist of who we are, Self ID is a summation of 'me' in a few words; because our brain loves summations, it loves soundbites and small pieces of information to process and it loves to do that fast.
So the concept of Self ID is not contentious, otherwise, everyone would be up in arms every day about every single person willy nilly Self IDing. It seems to be only contentious when a marginalised group does it
There is an element of social conformity here that's important to acknowledge, but we won't get into it here - namely, if you stand out from the socially accepted norms in any group, society will have a few words to say to you about it - i.e. don't stand out, we don't like it when you do that!. Individuality appears to be frowned upon.
Study into the body, bodily autonomy, agency and marginalisation is still quite recent, so it is understandable that the wider public has not, as of yet, adopted the idea that each of us is entitled to Self ID as we wish - despite every one of us doing it.
And so has become fashionable to refer to Self ID by any marginalised person or group as "identity politics".
When any marginalised person or group have the temerity to say 'I am me, I exist as a multifaceted being and I face inequalities because of individual aspects of my identity' we hear the bellows of 'IDENTITY POLITICS BOOOO' as rotten tomatoes are thrown at the speaker.
And so, when these marginalised people challenge this accusation of 'identity politics', they are often publically accused of and condemned for being "aggressive" and shutting down 'genuine reasonable debate', they and their allies are deemed to be the real bigots and abusers.
This is called gaslighting.
And it's a whole different topic and it's not something I'm going to get into in-depth here either.
Suffice it to say, there is a LOT of gaslighting of the trans and non-binary community and wider LGBTQIA+ community going on during this 'debate' by the cishets, from within the left. And it does need to be addressed.
Drop Your Pants!
We know the toilet has become a bit of a central tenet for the gender-critical 'feminist' argument against trans and non-binary people existing in women's social and private spaces. They argue, ad nauseam, that toilets are safe private spaces for women, and only women should be allowed in them. The problem is, they are only allowing for their own Self ID as a woman, not other peoples.
Let's talk disabled bodies
I have a paper which sums up this issue very well (I actually have a hard copy of it from my time at uni where I was fortunate enough to be taught by the writer in some sociology tutorials, but for the life of me I can't find it, so I'm limited to the online abstract)
" the impact that inaccessible toilets have on self and personhood and the hidden inequalities produced through these spaces, we can come to understand disabled peoples sense of (non) belonging.
at the centre of this article is a focus on the socio-political dualisms that locate disabled people at the margins of everyday citizenship. Through a feminist phenomenological analysis of the toilet and toileting bring to the fore how (non) belonging is felt
toilet(ing) then problematises the nature of so-called private and public spaces and by engaging bodily waste we come to understand citizenship through dirt"
Even just with this abstract, we can see that it's virtually impossible to not acknowledge the similarities around trans and non-binary bodies and disabled bodies and how they use - or rather are allowed to use - private and public spaces - the toilet in particular.
When we as a society limit marginalised groups autonomy and agency of their own body and it's use of public and private spaces, we are effectively further marginalising them.
This gem of a comment only highlights the gender critical 'feminists' obsession with other people in the toilet and their backwards view on women, bodily autonomy and their dictation of how we use it; we are too feminine to use even our own toilet in own house while a man is present... 1600 is that you calling?
this particular comment does seem to suggest there is an element of disgust about bodies and toilets, which I think perhaps underlies the gender-critical values and ideology.
Disability, Self ID, Abelsim
As I discussed earlier above, our bodily autonomy *should* mean our right to decide how we live in and use our body, but, it often does not mean this - for certain groups of people. Disabled people are one of these groups.
Disabled people have been Self IDing as disabled for a long time, however, that has not often been acepted by wider society,, in fact it has led to stigma and a variety of groups, institutiuons and campaigns to end stigma and inequality against disabled people.
The comment below was posted by a gender-critical 'feminist' who apparently doesn't just have a problem with trans and non-binary people Self IDing, in fact, there was an entire discussion around the idea that this disabled person was in fact not disabled because they Self ID as disabled.
This is, however, by no means a rare find in gender critical 'feminism', accusing disabled people of faking their disability is a regular occurrence, the below was said by a prominent gender-critical voice.
The comparisons between gender critical 'feminist' discourse around trans and non-binary people and Self ID and that of their discourse around disabled people and Self ID are hard to ignore.
Mental Illness, Ableism
This is not the only example of this kind of attack against disabled people and how they use or define their own body.
Even one of the most famous gender critical 'feminists' has waded into the muddy waters of ableism against the autistic community with an insinuation that autistic girls are somehow unable to think for themselves, this was met with backlash from the autistic community , and rightfully so.
After JK's essay people took to social media to tell the world that they also thought autistic people were unable to think for themselves or act in their own bodies and define their own gender.
Meanwhile, other gender critical 'feminists' have been stating that both being trans and having a mental illness are socially transmitted infections
and this comparison is not being made for the first time
.
The 'Wokeratie' Youth
The entire 'debate' around trans people and puberty blockers has me gripped.
TL;DR
I will reiterate that I believe that both philosophy and sociology are tools to dismantle the system which creates inequalities and marginalises whole groups of people
They are NOT tools to perpetuate marginalisation and inequality or beat marginalised groups with. These fields and those who work in them have a position of authority in our society, which should mean they are held to a higher standard than to be seen enabling or worsening moral panics and marginalisation of any group.
If they find that hard to do, then maybe they should be thinking about handing back their own as Self ID card which ID's them to us as a sociologist or philosopher.
The fact that so many gender critical 'feminists' are sociologists and philosophers really has me shook, I used to belive these positions were held by our societies greatest thinkers, and yet, every concept, theory, and way of thinking they have learned seems to have gone out the window in favour of their own underlying fears and biases - which I discussed in my last blog article.
Our identity is not for other to define, It's almost not even for us to define, it just is, and it is not set in stone, we change every day with every new experience in our individual body and each individual, unique experience it has. We are discovering who we are every single day we are alive
Our individual body, as an individual human being, is not for anyone else to dominate or control or own (without consent *winks*).
Some people seem to really resent other people Self IDing, using their understanding of their own body in our society.
However, Self ID is a crucial aspect of any marginalised group and their movements and fights against inequalities and every marginalised group of people, whether LGBTQIA+, disabled people, or young people need to be aware of bodily autonomy and its place in our fight against inequality.
Bodily autonomy is erased from trans and non-binary people, disabled people and young people by gender critical 'feminism'. Dictating who can and cannot use a public toilet excludes people from our public social spaces, further marginalising marginalised people.
Bodily autonomy is, and should be, at the heart of any movement in which a marginalised group are fighting for rights, because our body is the meeting place for every inequality we each face - and by god the bigots are determined to remove our ownership of it.
... uh oh I better duck, the hands of the patriarchal mob are starting to ready more tomatoes
I will leave you with the philosophy of The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows
'Lutalica'
"meet each other as we are, and ask, what is it like being you?"
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