Heartland Future Talks 2019: Judith Butler

What is the future of gender politics?
Moderator: Lotte Folke Kaarsholm

[@nikon.7255]

I think identity politics has given us the impression that we have become more progressive or “liberal” as a society in recent decades, while in fact economic inequality has widened significantly. It’s almost as if today’s cult of identity that dominates mainstream culture in the U.S. were both a proposed solution to, and a distraction from, this socioeconomic reality. Instead of focusing on the fact that some Americans are obscenely wealthy while many are miserably poor, we have focused our energies and attention on fine-tuning our ever detailed and complex individual identities and categorizing those aspects of ourselves which might prove disadvantageous, as if we could naval-gaze our way out of economic inequality. Unless we re-focus our attention on the most urgent problem facing the U.S. - socioeconomic disparity - “poor” may soon become another one of the immutable dimensions defining many Americans’ individual identities.

[@honeychurchgipsy6]

@Niko N. Thank you for your thoughtful and compassionate comment - I read it with my head nodding - the rich just keep getting richer it seems, and the poor poorer. However, identity politics is not the issue: remember that women's rights, black rights, gay and trans rights etc., are all about empowering those typically excluded from the table, and that being excluded means not having a fair chance at life. By bringing our attention to the inequalities in the world: that women, non-whites, poor whites, gay and trans people, are not being given the same chances, we are not causing the problems of inequality by drawing attention to them. Be wary of falling into the right's propaganda on this subject: they tell us that identity politics are bad all the while engaging in their own kind of toxic identity politics, and continuing to divide the very folk who should be coming together to fight inequality.

[@mmzmendo]

@@honeychurchgipsy6 That's the crux of the matter. All civil rights movements are being abused for this. so that you come to exactly this conclusion. So everything goes in circles and nothing changes for the better. Judith's ideologies come from the Institute for Social Research, an organization that was pushed exactly by those billionaires. Ideologues like Butler use manipulations like the *Overton window* and the *Motto & Bailey* to get people like you to come to these conclusions. Identity politics is by elites for elites.

[@yeayeayeaification]

It starts at 2:23

[@yndaeldborg3725]

What a great interview. Butler is the philosopher of our times and beyond!

[@depressoespresso420]

Really fantastic thank you for publishing this!

[@por9861]

Her smile on the thumbnail is so cute 😊

[@adamhussainart]

💚

[@1thunderlight]

Judith Butler is so smart, thank you.

[@TheSapphire51]

She is an obscurantist so it's impossible to saywhether she is smart or not. But I will tell you who is very smart and crystal clear in her expression Prof.Kathleen Stock.

[@BeeThorough]

@@TheSapphire51 Oh what nonsense. What you mean is that because you disagree with Butler you refuse to acknowledge her expertise.

[@TheSapphire51]

@@BeeThorough I happen to think she is a danger to women and girls. You think what you like.

[@BeeThorough]

A compelling argument based on solid statistics, I’m sure.

[@TheSapphire51]

@@BeeThorough No, just observation of her dissembling.

[@cuerposdisidentesliberacio2213]

It was very funny when Butler said the same that pope did about journalist would write about he said, "I can see the headline" jajaja

[@philferroni]

Every single human on Earth has fear, anxiety and feels out of place. It's the human condition. Live your life. Just don't force it on people. Like religion. Every one has the right to believe what they want, and no one likes being preached to. The right didn't start identity politics. Plus a person's nationality is the country you were born or you heritage. Not your sexual preference.

[@peterproleet8141]

Butler asks: "Why can somebody not be a small space of freedom" (9:09). If Butler came on this show as a guest totally naked, not sitting down but walking around shouting down the host not using the microphone while urinating on stage. Maybe then she would see why all cultures have conventions, structures and roles. They are essential for a stable society to function. Without them we would perish. An unstable society is bad for minorities too. It is completely wired in our biological system. Babies and adults copy and check each others behaviour all of the time. Imagine a world were gender is not visible. Dating and mating would be a bloody mess. Butler's idea's sound great but are not compatible with reality at all. It is a good thing to work on the acceptance of those who don't feel they fit in but the direction Butler is walking is a road to hell especially for minorities. She is called a theorist for a reason.

[@honeychurchgipsy6]

@Peter Proleet - Where has Butler ever called for an unstable society without rules or norms? Stop straw manning her and actually listen to what she says. Those societal conventions you speak of are not inherent because they are not always the same: I'm hoping that you don't think that all societies throughout all time have had the same notions of what is acceptable? Remember that the arguments you use were once used to criminalise gay people and oppress women who wished to be educated, and not be raped within marriage, etc. etc. "We can't allow that because society will fall down around our ears if we allow women to go to university/be doctors, or if we allow gay people to marry". I understand your concern about not being able to automatically know what biological sex a person is (it's impossible to hide gender identity because it is how you present yourself to the world), but this happens all the time already because some individuals are naturally androgynous looking; it's not uncommon to be unsure whether someone is a man or woman - get to know them and you might find out - now three's an idea!!

[@peterproleet8141]

​@@honeychurchgipsy6 I said that her ideas of no genderroles and subjective conventions which are not based on reality lead to a unstable society. That is my conclusion and my opinion not hers. An opinion can hardly be a strawman. A strawman is a false summary of someone else's opinion. Like you just did ;-). I know that conventions naturally change but if you start building a society on only subjective grounds and not reality it will sink. According to Butler the heteronorm is a construct. That is ignoring the deep reality of life. Explain to me why claiming that conventions and roles are a inevitable part of society is dangeorus. It is the same as claiming that everybody with a knive in his hands is murderer. "Some people are androgynous looking" and "It happens all the time" do not go along togeher well. We both know that transpeople and androgynous people are not in the least the majority. The world is not made out of David Bowies. Last week my daughter saw Prince and Bowie and she thought playing with gender identity was not of the past. But it has always existed around the margins and it will and that is naturally. Teenager and artists do it to see what it is all about. It can be fun even. But Butler is none of that. She lives on these margins and wants the whole world to be that way. In that she shows her complete ignorance and understanding of life itself. The academy, politics or science is not a place for artists or identity seeking teenagers.Butler should grow up and face reality. That is the best advice for any minority before he/she falls prey to an ideology and lose their unique soul. It always ends in bitterness and fist shaking at the world.

[@peterproleet8141]

​@@honeychurchgipsy6 I said her ideas of no genderroles and subjective conventions are leading to an unstable society. That is my conclusion and my opinion. You contribute them to Butler but not me. An opinion is not a strawman. If saying that conventions and rules are inevitbale in societies is dangerous than i guess i am a evil oppressor ;-) The world is not made out of androgynous people like David Bowie or Prince. Artist and identity seeking teenagers play with identity that is fine and even fun. But thinking that the whole of society should act that way is very ignorant to me. If Prince was an accountant he woulnd't wear to work what he did on stage. Most of the Woke people don't understand life and can't distinguish media, fashion and entertainment from real life. They live in their own subjective perceptions (society facilitates that more and more) and want everybody to do the same. This is a bad strategy for people period but especially for minorities. Telling people that the world is wrong and set up against you, leads to bitterness and i hate to see that happen to minorities close to me that i love.

[@LizaFan]

Butler isn't antinormative per se - they're antinormative, insofar as a norm is conducive to injustice and violence.

[@beartrapperkc]

the worship in this room is bizarre. cultish.

[@Finne57]

That was cool!

[@JoeMicroscope]

If you are male of female, lead your life how ever you wish and let that define what that gender is for you. I think society is quite able to accept that the two main genders overlap in the way they wish to express themselves. I believe in male and female being the two main sexes based on XX and XY chromosomes. Outside of that gender is relatively unnecessary as a way of defining the individual.

[@IvanTre]

Yeah, lead whatever life you wish but be wildly aware that you cannot ignore nature, whether Nature or your own nature. It gives no shits about rights, desires. In fact, it's where your own desires spring from. I find it curious this Butler 'scholar' seems to regards our 'desires' as in some sense being serious things and not just natural drives evolution has endowed with. She seems to think they matter! Wotan help me. Too bad he's just another dumb myth. There's no help, there are no adults in the room. It's all just us deluded apes in here.

[@philferroni]

Yes overlap, but you still are one or the other. It's a fact and nothing can change that.

[@richardkovacs2006]

How about not being so rigid about sex/gender and accept, that there are masculine WOMEN (still women) and feminine MEN (still men) and therefore accept, that people are colorful? Her theory forces people into very rigid terms of gender, based on how you act/behave. I think her theory is very discirimiantory towards people who don't fit the norm. Her norm, to be precise.

[@JoeMicroscope]

@@richardkovacs2006 I agree. Lets relax the stereotypical idea of gender's.

[@honeychurchgipsy6]

@@richardkovacs2006 - and yet she's non binary - so how does your straw man of her position work now? Please try and actually listen to her instead of watching five seconds, getting angry and then posting comments. Her position is the antithesis of rigidity. Her entire theory of gender as performative and everything she is saying here is about allowing individuals to be themselves whatever they are.

[@philferroni]

No one cares how anyone walks. It's definitely not a problem how anyone walks... Your talking about a very small minority of people. You shouldn't apply a fraction of people and apply it to everyone. That's just not fair...

[@LizaFan]

Tell that to people beaten on the street for the way they walk.

[@IvanTre]

If she's one of the best feminism has, the whole discipline has to go. No question about it.

[@BlogofTheW3st]

Why so?

[@richardkovacs2006]

@@BlogofTheW3st because her theory is very rigid and many ways contradicts reality.

[@honeychurchgipsy6]

@@richardkovacs2006 - is it/ does it? Which parts are particularly rigid in your opinion?

[@honeychurchgipsy6]

@Y.T. - I'm going out on a limb here, but I suspect that you would rather like to see the entire feminist movement disappear, not just Butler. Am I wrong?

[@IvanTre]

@@honeychurchgipsy6 that's what I said, yes-

[@henkverhoeven1256]

When I first heard of the ideas of Judith Butler, I thought: Oh my God, what a bunch of idiot ideas. But then I started reading her work and studying her ideas. And now I still think: Oh my god, what a bunch of idiot ideas.

[@yeayeayeaification]

Which particular idea she expressed in the interview did you find idiotic?

[@gozderdogan]

That's probably because you are an idiot yourself.

[@chernobylcoleslaw6698]

**LMAO**

[@richardkovacs2006]

@@gozderdogan The difference: he called her IDEAS idiotic, not her personally. You called HIM as a person an idiot, just because he has a different opinion. Do you understand the difference? Now that's the problem with following Judith Butler without being critical.

[@rahulkhurana45]

you dont have that much intelligence to understand and subsequently analyse the depth her intellect Dull minded gye you are.