{"id":133523,"date":"2023-09-05T13:17:28","date_gmt":"2023-09-05T17:17:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/?p=133523"},"modified":"2023-09-06T15:33:05","modified_gmt":"2023-09-06T19:33:05","slug":"mit-professor-says-oxford-press-dropped-his-book-for-criticism-of-trans-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/mit-professor-says-oxford-press-dropped-his-book-for-criticism-of-trans-issues\/","title":{"rendered":"MIT professor says Oxford press dropped his book for criticism of trans issues"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><strong>Philosopher says publisher canned his book for &#8216;a critical analysis of gender identity&#8217; <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>A philosophy professor whose manuscript on sex and gender issues was rejected by the world&#8217;s largest university press says transgender ideology is a &#8220;third rail&#8221; topic.<\/p>\n<p>Massachusetts Institute of Technology Professor Alex Byrne signed a contract with Oxford University Press for his book &#8220;Trouble with Gender: Sex Facts, Gender Fictions,&#8221; <em>The Times UK<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thetimes.co.uk\/article\/oxford-dropped-my-book-for-challenging-gender-says-author-bkfvmq55c\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">reported<\/a> Saturday. After the publisher received the manuscript, it told him he did not cover the subject in a &#8220;sufficiently serious or respectful way.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Byrne (<em>pictured<\/em>) disagreed, noting the more than 100,000 words he had submitted as a first draft, his 16,000 words of endnotes, and a substantial bibliography. However, he accepted OUP&#8217;s decision after noting a clause in the contract stating the work had to be &#8220;fit for publication,&#8221; <em>The Times<\/em> reported.<\/p>\n<p>Byrne found another publisher but told <em>The Times<\/em> that OUP had rejected his book &#8220;because it contained a critical analysis of gender identity.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThese days race and transgender issues are both like the third rail of public discourse,&#8221; the professor told the news outlet. &#8220;You can get in very serious trouble by saying the wrong things about either topic.&#8221;<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">My trouble with \u201cTrouble with Gender\u201d is in the London Times.<a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/GQx3vScV2x\">https:\/\/t.co\/GQx3vScV2x<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; alex byrne (@byrne_a) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/byrne_a\/status\/1697798149396377981?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 2, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>In 2020, the peer-reviewed journal <em>Philosophical Studies<\/em> published Byrne&#8217;s paper &#8220;Are women adult human females?&#8221; In the paper, Byrne offered six arguments for why women should be defined this way.<\/p>\n<p>That caused &#8220;a storm,&#8221; but &#8220;if you read the paper, it is totally explicit that this has nothing to do with how transgender people should be treated,&#8221; Byrne told the news outlet.<\/p>\n<p>Byrne also said he had been &#8220;absolutely horrified&#8221; by the treatment of former professor and transgender ideology critic Kathleen Stock at Sussex University, according to <em>The Times.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Stock, an English philosopher who has affirmed the male-female binary and argued that gender should not trump sex in all circumstances, spoke at the Oxford Union in May despite major protests leading up to the event, <em>The College Fix<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/police-remove-activist-who-glued-hand-to-floor-at-gender-critic-talk\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">reported<\/a> at the time.<\/p>\n<p>She quit her job at Sussex in 2021 &#8220;because of what she called &#8216;a medieval experience&#8217; of campus ostracism and protest,&#8221; <em>The Guardian<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/education\/2021\/nov\/03\/kathleen-stock-says-she-quit-university-post-over-medieval-ostracism\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">reported<\/a> at the time.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>MORE: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/meet-the-professors-who-support-gender-critic-speech-at-oxford\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Meet the Oxford professors supporting Kathleen Stock<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>IMAGE: Massachusetts Institute of Technology<\/p>\n            <div class=\"article-truncate-control\">\n                <button class=\"show-complete-article\">\n                    Read More                <\/button>\n            <\/div>\n\n        ","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Philosopher says publisher canned his book for &#8216;a critical analysis of gender identity.&#8217;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1269,"featured_media":133524,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1361],"tags":[50859,1961,391,35213,48185,50862,10795,18620,50861,815,5387,47736,50863,32396,16878,50860],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/09\/AlexByrne.MIT_.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2Oh4L-yJB","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133523"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1269"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133523"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133523\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":133582,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133523\/revisions\/133582"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}