I leave it to women to decide for themselves the nature of their safe spaces and athletic competitions. While trans women are certainly entitled to their say, it doesn't mean their view should override all others.

Yes, however humans are not animals, actually I should take that back because as we can see a lot of humans are worse than animals and it is often an insult to animals.

@Jolanta humans are very much so animals, we just have more intellect.

The problem with that statement is that gender is still poorly understood as a biological question. It seems highly likely that both genes and hormones play a role in the formation of our personal sense of gender. But the jury is still very unch out on the science of these mechanisms. People make the mistake of assuming that if we cannot point to a scientific explanation (yet), then it must be a choice or at best the product of socialization. That not necessarily true. Ultimately, "debating" over someone else's right to be themself is inhumane and unjustifiable.

@MikeInBatonRouge i don't think anyone is debating that here.

@Tejas when you say Dawkins is a man of science, you imply that his statements are scientically correct. I am saying these particular statements are based on scientifically incomplete facts. Yes, science is always incomplete. But it is easy to forget that the speaker touted as scientist is not automatically correct, even scientifically. There are still missing pieces to that puzzle.

@MikeInBatonRouge you are adding arguments that noone made. He only said how people react he didn't say anything for or against trans people? Did you read his tweets?

@Tejas I read them. I don't condemn Dawkins. I disagree with how he addressed this specific point. It reminds me a lot of Sam Harris, whom I also admire for many insights and yet get frustrated by select instances of social tone deafness. Dawkins I expect to be smart enough to anticipate how his statements will be perceieved.

For the record, I think the Humanist Association's reaction was overkill and another in a wide web of frustrating cancel-culture reactionary moves. Gotta check out Ezra Klein's NY Times artical on cancel culture this week. In the tradition of respect for the scientific process, we have to be able to confront others on difference in the merits of their opinions without condemning that person and trying to destroy them professionally.

But I actually was quibbling with your comment more than with Dawkins, the "Dawkins is a man of science..." Commented based in biology, and that he is correct." You missed or ignored crucially important nuances with that statement, namely that bioligy science has NOT yet answered the mystery of gender identity. It is not a settled question, and biological sex is not the same as gender.