New research from Canton Winer! Gender identity detachment: New term allows people to skip gender entirely. share.google/uoS3hFDjV2UR...

Now that Kirk's killer seems to be caught, maybe the news could spare a moment's attention for the right wing, from the commentariat up to the GOP and president, whose immediate reaction was not mourning, but to seize the opportunity to try to incite violence against groups they hate

If you know much about authoritarians, you know that they pounce at the chance to exploit a crisis. That’s one reason many people are fearful in the wake of Charlie Kirk’s shooting. It's easy to feel hopeless right now. But as a sociologist, I see some real reasons for hope.

I don’t relish seeing anyone shot. It’s horrible. But spare me the calls for empathy for a man who built a career railing against empathy.

Dehumanization is a form of political violence, one that Charlie Kirk knew well.

UC-Davis is hiring for a tenure-track assistant professor in the sociology of gender. See more details here: careercenter.asanet.org/job/1311028/...

As I learned in critical theory: "Law is the institution by which Power declares itself Virtue."

The New Yorker asked me “how bad” today’s Supreme Court ruling was. I boiled it down to one paragraph: link.newyorker.com/view/5bda429...

The lack of arms is so dehumanizing. And I think you could reasonably argue that the placement of the crescents suggests a chest that hasn't finished puberty yet.

Yessss let's get more recognition for this research!!!

Slate recently covered my research on “gender detachment,” or the idea that some people feel disconnected from identifying with any gender identity! I’m grateful for the opportunity to reflect on what this attention signifies—not just for my work but for how we collectively understand gender.

I would love to know how many of the people mentioned are autistic or otherwise neurodivergent. This really sounds like autigender. Especially since this story came out of a study on asexuality, and the ace community also has a high percentage of autistic people.

For those of us for whom gender is a junk drawer of rules that defy sense 🎶

Howdy! I’ve got a new @slate.com story, about some really fascinating work researcher @cantonwiner.bsky.social is doing around asexuality and a concept he coined called “gender detachment”

I'm not right wing but some of this "woke" stuff is a little over the top [6 months later] Slavery was fine. Your city is under martial law

This article is an excellent guide to what you can and should be doing right now. Many people seem to think that fascism is a switch that gets flipped, but it's really a machine that the government needs to keep feeding quarters into. Your job is to exhaust the state until they quit.

The purveyors of AI want us to believe that AI is the perfect educator. Because they want us to believe that it's more effective to invest tax dollars in private companies than in public services.

"but crime is a real issue, people are worried about crime and you have to take that seriously" No you don't! If people are getting more scared about crime while crime is happening less frequently, it's a made up issue and you should make a point of yelling that all the time

Once you understand that a driving principle of American politics is there is no such thing as a compassionate solution that's cheap enough or a cruel solution that's too expensive, a lot of things click into place.

Absolutely thrilled to win the 2025 Distinguished Article Award from ASA Sexualities alongside these amazing scholars! Check out the article, "'I Didn’t Know Ace Was a Thing': Bisexuality and pansexuality as identity pathways in asexual identity formation.” Link below.

🚨New Blog from @cantonwiner.bsky.social: Does everyone *have* a #gender? "The concept of gender detachment resists the assumption that everyone does (and should) have a gender identity—an assumption I call compulsory gender." #sociology #ASA2025 #ASA25 contexts.org/blog/does-ev...

The Spring 2025 issue of ASA’s Contexts Magazine @contexts.org! It includes the piece “Is Asexuality Queer?” in which Canton Winer @cantonwiner.bsky.social, Northern Illinois U, extends sexualities research to consider queer gatekeeping. Open access ends 8/11. https://bit.ly/ContextsSpring25

The thing is, as we discover more clearly every day, is: The 'University' is NOT us. It's not the students, not the faculty, not even our administrators. It's the TRUSTEES - often big donors with MBAs. They can be just as hostile to the work of Higher Ed & eager to join in destroying it.

So many things wrong w/ this, but one is that univ's are places where people go to learn. This includes learning how to be a free person in a democracy. Students must be free to protest, but also free to make mistakes. The lesson here is: You are not free & we will use your learning to oppress you.

We’re recruiting a book review editor to join our existing team. Details👇 www.lexnetwork.org/gender-and-j... ✳️ Deadline 1. 8 .25 Please circulate @deirdreflynn.bsky.social @nicolabarker.bsky.social @fmeasham.bsky.social @leahfburch.bsky.social @whaireland.bsky.social @geogsara.bsky.social 1/2

Calling Black acespecs and aroheads! We have a Discord! #blackaces #blackace #blackasexual #blackaromantics #asexuality #asexual #aroace #acearo #aromantic #acespec #arospec #black

Latest issue is here! contexts.org/articles/sp25-toc/ Peer-reviewed features: ↪️ @cantonwiner.bsky.social on asexuality and queer gatekeeping ↪️ @makchur.bsky.social and JV Bastidas on EJ metrics ↪️ @avbsoc.bsky.social‬ on conservatorships ↪️ Burr et al. on med school debt #Sociology

The Epstein rift has real potential to fracture the MAGA coalition. Many are drawn to MAGA because of anti-elite (“populist”) impulses. Trump’s about-face on Epstein shows that elites are still very much in charge—that they’re the “man behind the curtain.”

Calling my fellow straights:

Took the survey (easy), firstly to see how people are researching sexuality (very glad to see), but also because I believe in research karma. Given the backlash against peoples’ sexual and gender identities in the world right now, please consider taking so that we continue to produce solid research.

New! Sociologist @cantonwiner.bsky.social on #asexuality and its place in the queer community: Extending sexualities research to consider queer gatekeeping allows us to reimagine just how much room there is under the rainbow journals.sagepub.com/doi/epdf/10....

Huge thanks to the asexual folks who took our survey! We have plenty of LGBTQIA+ responses, but we need more straights participants. Can you share this 10 minute survey on relationships/attraction with a few straight people in your life? psicologiagenerale.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_...

I’m not on the asexuality spectrum. But as a queer, feminist researcher, I think we should all care about asexuality. Why? Because asexual perspectives can help us better understand sexuality—and gender, race, disability, family, love, etc. Here’s why:

White evangelicals’ profound hatred of immigrants and the poor seems to be at odds with their professed commitment to “what the text of the Bible says.” Could it be that the Bible, for them, is a national theatrical prop rather than a source of transcendent wisdom?

Your Prime Day reminder that half of Amazon warehouse workers struggle with food & housing costs. A third have had to rely on government assistance like SNAP — which is about to get cut. If Bezos can spend $50M on a wedding, Amazon can afford to treat its workers with dignity.

Coming soon, we've got @cantonwiner.bsky.social on asexuality and queer gatekeeping, @makchur.bsky.social and Juanita Vivas Bastidas on cumulative impact and environmental justice, William Burr et al. on medical school debt and the physician shortages, and Alex V. Barnard on conservatorships!

The Democrats are not an opposition party, they are a rival party.

What happens when sexual and romantic orientations diverge? @cantonwiner.bsky.social tells us this week @CCFamilies.bsky.social blog hosted by @TheSocietyPages.bsky.social Check it out: thesocietypages.org/ccf/

Sex positivity and asexuality inclusion are complementary goals. Enabling people to say no to sex they don’t want is sex positive. Consent is sex positive. Embracing human diversity is sex positive.

y'know it's kind of a tell that they think celebrating the end of slavery is DEI

Really interesting article exploring how some people are more detached from the idea of gender

"My findings lead me to propose a more expansive understanding of compulsory gender in which identifying with any gender identity—whether within the man/woman binary or not—is compulsory." Yes this is absolutely correct and true

Our research won the @asanews.bsky.social Sexualities Distinguished Article Award! In this article, we examine the relationships between bisexuality and asexuality. We find that half of asexual folks previously identified as bisexual or pansexual. And many continue IDing as bi/pan AND ace.

Just got around to reading this; it's excellent, highly recommend I sent it to GVD immediately after I was done reading... awhile back they tried to ask me about gender/sexuality and I had a panic attack. But this gets at what I was trying to articulate: ¿wtf even is gender?

Our paper won the Distinguished Article Award from the ASA @asanews.bsky.social Sexualities Section!!! Here's the link to our article: doi.org/10.1177/1363...

Recruitment is still open! Help us by participating in a survey about attraction and intimate relationships. All are welcome, but we’re especially low on heterosexual responses. Please share widely! psicologiagenerale.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_...

My article on gender detachment is published in @sociusjournal.bsky.social! We often assume that everyone has a gender. But some people feel detached from gender. Based on 30 interviews with asexual individuals, I argue that gender categorization is compulsory--but it doesn't need to be.

(Ironically, global reach and interdisciplinarity are the things that the current and the previous ASR editors claim to value, respectively.)

I love @cantonwiner.bsky.social's work and his studies on Gender Detachment and Asexuality really speak to me. Check it out if it speaks to you... open.substack.com/pub/cantonwi...

Open access! New research from ASA member Canton Winer @cantonwiner.bsky.social‬, Northern Illinois University, draws on interviews with 30 asexual individuals to explore the plausibility of ungendering and introduces the concept of "gender detachment." ‪@sociusjournal.bsky.social‬ bit.ly/4dYyzB9