Identity wars in psychology and Education.
This topic could be in philosophies of politics, mind, science, ethics, epistemology... It follows on from my previous thread, and it's liable to be controversial, so I hope the mods are awake. The identity I want to focus on is gender, and in order to slow you down a bit I'm going to ask you to read some stuff before you fulminate, viz:
APA Guidelines for Psychological Practice for Boys and Men
Twelve Scholars Respond to the APA’s Guidance for Treating Men and Boys
These are the two sides of the war, and if you want to follow up any of the links on either side, feel free. But before you join battle on either side, maybe consider the possibility of neutrality.
But It looks like even the attempt at gender neutrality is politically one-sided. And that is where I want to begin to look. Sweden has been conducting this one-sided political/educational experiment for long enough that there are human cultural results:
Perhaps you have evidence to the contrary, but it does not seem to me from what I have read so far, that this sort of gender neutrality in education has resulted in much trauma or confusion about gender identity. Whereas, the politicised gender war taking place in America does seem more poisonous. To be specific, I would suggest that the conflict exemplified in the links above puts pressure onto children to conform to or else to rebel against gender stereotypes that may result in an increase in identification as transgender and so on.
So here is a hypothesis to consider philosophically:
To the extent that gender differences are biologically rather than culturally conditioned, gender neutrality in education and wider society will have no effect on personality or identity. To the extent that such differences are culturally conditioned, they are distorting constraints on human freedom, barriers to equality, and potential causes of psychological conflict and trauma.
APA Guidelines for Psychological Practice for Boys and Men
Twelve Scholars Respond to the APA’s Guidance for Treating Men and Boys
These are the two sides of the war, and if you want to follow up any of the links on either side, feel free. But before you join battle on either side, maybe consider the possibility of neutrality.
But It looks like even the attempt at gender neutrality is politically one-sided. And that is where I want to begin to look. Sweden has been conducting this one-sided political/educational experiment for long enough that there are human cultural results:
In Trodje, the first wave of preschoolers to attend gender-neutral preschools are now 20-somethings.
Elin Gerdin, 26, part of that first wave, is studying to be a teacher. In appearance she is conventionally feminine, her long dark hair coaxed into spirals with a curling iron. This is something she points out — that in appearance she is conventionally feminine. It is the first sign that she views gender as something you could put on or take off, like a raincoat.
“This is a choice I have made because this is me,” she said of her appearance. “And this is me because I am a product of society.”
There are moments when her early education comes back to her in flashes.
Ms. Gerdin’s friends have begun to have babies, and they post pictures of them on Facebook, swathed in blue or pink, in society’s first act of sorting. Ms. Gerdin gets upset when this happens. She feels sorry for the children. She makes it a point to seek her friends out and tell them, earnestly, that they are making a mistake. This feels to her like a responsibility.
Perhaps you have evidence to the contrary, but it does not seem to me from what I have read so far, that this sort of gender neutrality in education has resulted in much trauma or confusion about gender identity. Whereas, the politicised gender war taking place in America does seem more poisonous. To be specific, I would suggest that the conflict exemplified in the links above puts pressure onto children to conform to or else to rebel against gender stereotypes that may result in an increase in identification as transgender and so on.
So here is a hypothesis to consider philosophically:
To the extent that gender differences are biologically rather than culturally conditioned, gender neutrality in education and wider society will have no effect on personality or identity. To the extent that such differences are culturally conditioned, they are distorting constraints on human freedom, barriers to equality, and potential causes of psychological conflict and trauma.
Comments (206)
This of course assumes that gender neutrality policies are executed in such a manner as to not turn into distorting constraints themselves. The argument, as far as I understand it, of the "conservative" faction is that gender "neutrality" is biased against traditional gender roles, aiming to suppress them. In a gender neutral environment, there might be peer pressure not to overtly display attributes traditionally expressed with your biological sex.
The problem is there's just no reason to think so. U.S. conservatism in particular has a long history of endlessly saying that any attempt to change things at all is an "attack" on their traditionalist ways. It has the merit of being trivially true in the sense that if by "attack" or bias one means "not staying the same" then sure, it's an "attack. At the same time, it seems to be besides the point. As another example of this behavior, this was and is exactly the claim made against allowing homosexual marriages, that it represents an attack on the traditional concept of marriage, interracial marriage, women in the workplace, and so on.
From OP's Sweden example it certainly doesn't appear that there are any issues regarding peer pressure against overt displays of gender expression (whatever exactly 'overt' means in this context). I'm not saying you're agreeing with the conservative view on this, but I confess I find it very irritating to see an identical argument made for repressive views repackaged for every perceived sleight and then having to give any real consideration to the people making the argument. It's a boy who cried wolf situation. Eventually, at least when made by the group in question, it can't be taken to seriously on their word alone. An actual analysis of potential issues in practice would need to be done.
Americans, don't you know, wish to be left alone to their own devices, permitted to do whatever they want? The offensiveness of seeing a boy clothed in pink is dwarfed by the offensiveness that the schools, the government, or any APA "expert" knows better how to raise my kids and thinks he or she has the right to weigh in on it.
My assumption, and it seems to bear out in the Swedish example, is that modern society doesn't require regimented male/female roles so much anymore, and it's entirely possible to live happily ever after never being exposed to them. Whether there is an innate inclination for boys to rough house and girls to play house, maybe, but it's doubtful that not catering to those innate drives will amount to much harm. It's also doubtful that raising boys like traditional boys and girls like traditional girls is going to do much harm either, assuming there is no abusiveness or humiliation in the process.
This strikes me as a government intrusion issue more than an issue of conservatives trying to demand how their neighbors raise their children.
Just for instance, the APA highlights "gender strain". I know a thing or two about that, and can affirm that sexual partner preference and most comfortable gender role can put one in conflict, not just with the dominant society but with one's preferred deviant sexual subculture as well. There also are the gender strains having more to with occupational roles, and competitive performance on the job. And more besides.
The APA claims there is such a thing as "Masculinity Ideology" which "is a set of descriptive, prescriptive, and proscriptive of cognitions about boys and men" including
Is there such a thing as "Masculinity ideology"? Probably not. Is there a preference among boys and men for masculine behavior (whatever all that might mean), achievement, (at least the appearance of) strength, pleasure in adventure, tolerance of risk, and a certain tolerance for violence (at least in some situations)? Most likely.
I know what fascist ideology is; I know what capitalist or communist ideology is. They exist. They're been formalized, elucidated at great length. Masculinist ideology? No. There is a much stronger argument for a feminist ideology. Where does the APA stand on feminist ideologues?
Oh deary me, who will defend out poor neutered nation?
It's hard to comprehend just how badly people that are purportedly intelligent and educated can misunderstand a simple message. So hard that one can't help suspecting that the misunderstanding is, at least in part, deliberate.
Let's lay out the message that they were unable to discern:
Society may indeed need some people to be aggressive and others to be nurturing, but there is absolutely no reason why the aggressive ones must be male and the nurturers must be female. So let's raise out children so that it is open to them to be either, or some mixture of the two. Let us discourage only harmful behaviours and encourage any non-harmful behaviours that the child enjoys.
For all we know, such raising may result in our having more aggressive people than we currently do. Perhaps the world's fiercest army will be that of a country where gender-neutral raising occurs, and will be dominated by women.
There are more features encompassed by gender norms than just aggression and nurturing, but exactly the same rule applies to those. Perhaps a gender-neutral country will have more female physicists and more straight, male designers.
But the thing that irks me the most, as well as confirming the poor education or analytical skills of the twelve fulminators, is their misuse of the term Stoic. As an admirer of the Stoic philosophy, I abhor the tendency of philosophical ignoramuses to use the term as if it means emotionless and uncaring (it doesn't), and as if it were specifically associated with being male (it isn't). This is tolerable and understandable in street talk amongst those that have no reason to know better. But it is disgraceful from people that string lists of letters after their name in their byline to apparently demonstrate how educated they are.
They are circumspect, but I can afford to name names. https://jordanbpeterson.com/political-correctness/comment-on-the-apa-guidelines-for-the-treatment-of-boys-and-men/
Yes, fairly mild liberal stuff from the APA. But that's all it takes for the reactionary hordes, sorry, "scholars" to emerge foaming at the mouth.
Typical example:
"Psychologists strive to build and promote gender-sensitive psychological services."
"It has been suggested that many men do not seek psychological help because services are not in alignment with masculine cultural norms that equate asking for assistance for psychological and emotional concerns with shame and weakness (Addis & Mahalik, 2003). An understanding of gender norms when designing services for boys and men may lead to greater participation among this population (Mahalik et al., 2012)."
Foam-at-the-mouth-reactionary-scholars:
"How dare you! You'll turn them into sissies!"
Quoting Hanover
These are guidelines for psychologists dealing with kids. And, yes, if someone brings their kid to a psychologist, the presumption is that they want that expert to "weigh in" on things. I'm not seeing the offensiveness here.
This seems like a general indictment of conservatism to an extend. I don't disagree with you, but might a conservative not say that keeping things slow to avoid too rapid social changes is the point? One legitimate reason for a conservative position is to wait for more data when the consequences of a change may be far reaching.
Quoting MindForged
Actually analyzing what a "gender neutral" education looks like and pointing out specific problems is certainly the rational approach. One can come up with possible problems, but all of those depend on the practical implementation. It also depends on just how much common problems that are statistically linked to gender/sex are actually linked only to biological sex.
Americans seem to sometimes exhibit a particular psychosis concerning government involvement, but the APA is not a government agency. So I wonder what the issue is with a group of private citizens providing their view?
Quoting unenlightened
I thought Jordan Peterson ideology was that everything bad in the world is due to postmodernist cultural Marxists (who, according to this piece, sometimes disguise themselves as psychologists).
Actually makes my satirical "How dare you! You'll turn them into sissies!" look mild.
It seems clear, though, that the largest part of mental suffering is the result of social craziness--(Erich Fromm: The Sane Society, 1958). (Sane Society PDF)
Psychotherapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, counselors, social workers, etc. are in no position to take on a crazy society.
Along with a word of wisdom from the mother-in-law. 'Even the lowest, foulest tramp looks down on every woman.'
Aqualung
Jethro Tull
Sitting on a park bench
Eying little girls with bad intent
Snots running down his nose
Greasy fingers smearing shabby clothes, hey, Aqualung
Drying in the cold sun
Watching as the frilly panties run, hey, Aqualung
Feeling like a dead duck
Spitting out pieces of his broken luck, oh, Aqualung
Sun streaking cold, an old man wandering lonely
Taking time, the only way he knows
Leg hurting bad as he bends to pick a dog end
He goes down to a bog and warms his feet
Feeling alone, the army's up the road
Salvation a la mode and a cup of tea
Aqualung, my friend, don't you start away uneasy
You poor old sod, you see it's only me
Do you still remember
December's foggy freeze
When the ice that clings on to your beard
It was screaming agony
Hey and you snatch your rattling last breaths
With deep-sea diver sounds
And the flowers bloom like
Madness in the spring
Sun streaking cold, an old man wandering lonely
Taking time, the only way he knows
Leg hurting bad as he bends to pick a dog end
He goes down to a bog and warms his feet
Feeling alone, the army's up the road
Salvation a la mode and a cup of tea
Aqualung my friend don't you start away uneasy
You poor old sod, you see it's only me
Aqualung my friend don't you start away uneasy
You poor old sod, you see it's only me
Sitting on a park bench
Eying up little girls with bad intent
Snots running down his nose
Greasy fingers smearing shabby clothes, hey Aqualung
Drying in the cold sun
Watching as the frilly panties run, hey Aqualung
Feeling like a dead duck
Spitting out pieces of his broken luck, hey Aqualung
This discussion deals with what policy ought be adopted by a society in raising children, with the OP suggesting gender neutrality is a defensible objective. My objection would be in that policy being enforced on others who haven't asked for direction. Good parenting is as much based upon personal morality and tradition as it is a science, and it would be an intrusion to enforce the opinions of psychologists upon parents if they've not sought out those opinions.
I'm not trying to censor their beliefs, but more so just trying to relegate them to the role of jeering from the sideline. They can say whatever they want, but I don't want them making parenting policy for the masses.
And no, there's no psychosis in questioning government. Do you need examples of why that is so?
They're not, they're making policy for psychological practice, i.e. for psychologists, which is what they're supposed to do. Why can't you let them have their cake and you eat yours? Why the defensiveness?
Sure, but if I go to a psychologist, I expect science. If I want personal morality and tradition, I'll consult my conscience, or a priest, or a witchdoctor (depending on my tradition).
You're liable to be disappointed. However, they are well known for banging on about education, parenting and politics, as well as giving solicited advice to the gullible distressed.
I expect their bangings on to at least be based on scientific research, which is better than the alternatives on display, and respect their right to bang on each other, and find the vitriol directed at such banging misdirected.
Perhaps the examples I gave weren't apt then, because the U.S. conservatives were not for introducing gay rights or interracial marriage slowly, they staunchly opposed it completely (the only noteworthy other view was the idea that it should be left to the states... Not hard to know what that actually means though). And in fact, it would sound rather odd for them to have argued the previous examples I gave would be OK if done slowly. Like are gay rights *really* going to have some terrible far reaching negative consequences if given quickly or is that more likely to be fear mongering against the idea itself?
Quoting Echarmion
Well sure but you mentioned before that the conservative argument is that these gender neutrality policies are biased against traditional gender roles and expression with the intent to or resulting in suppressing them. By itself it's just a claim that falls in line with their general antipathy to social change of any sort beyond the usual, it doesn't have any inherent plausibility and so we need to actually to as dispassionate an analysis as we can, without giving undue credence to their complaints going in.
Like if their complaints really come down to "But things are/will be different" and we indeed find some small difference in the rate of certain sexes expressing their gender a certain way, that cannot be taken as validating their preconceived notion that they're being oppressed. Unless by "oppressed" we just mean "different". It seems to me that the claim of kids being made to act different is what would have to be borne out.
You are going to be disappointed again.
[quote=Jordan Peterson] The authors are claiming that men who socialize their boys in a traditional manner destroy their mental health. [/quote]
[Italicisation by Peterson. Bolding and underlining by me.]
If that were the case, the APA document could rightly be interpreted as an attack on men, as Peterson claims it is, because it would be saying that it is either exclusively or predominantly men that inflict psychological damage on their sons by forcing gender roles onto them.
Yet I cannot see anywhere in the APA document that it says it is men doing this enforcement. It uses the passive voice everywhere I saw, and talks about how it is damaging for a gender role to be forced onto a child. Never does it mention men doing the forcing. The natural inference would be that it is both parents. A more realistic inference might be that, since women still do most of the child-rearing across society on average, most of the gender-role enforcement is being done by women.
If Peterson cannot get this simple, and utterly crucial, fact right, how can he be taken seriously in anything else he says?
I don't find Jordan Peterson objectionable, but maybe that is a matter of taste (degustibus...) and of course I don't know the guy -- beyond text and video.
Those trained to the doctorate level seem more reliable than the masters level, or less. "Counseling" can boil down to providing what a good friend provides -- a patient ear, common sense, stuff like that. Not to devalue having a "good friend" whether paid by the hour or not paid at all.
Psychiatrists, being MDs and having the power and competence to prescribe drugs and admit patients to hospital, are essential for the management of major mental illness, like schizophrenia, bi-polar, severe depression, psychosis, etc.
I've been in consciousness raising groups and have led group support meetings. Individuals can sometimes gain solid therapy for themselves from the group of untrained participants. Peer-led mental health support groups seem to be helpful for people, even if they are no substitute for psychiatric care.
One of the problems I see with counselors is that like some other professionals, they are out practicing on their own. They're not part of a group, and they don't have much oversight. "Psychotherapy" is not as well defined as dentistry, for example. (And unsupervised dentists can be bad news, too,)
There are many levels at which men and women differ. We should scan these and judge which are harmful and which are not. We can't simply dump everything under the pretext of equality. It's a tough decision because it's a choice between equality, a rational choice and gender differences, a fact. I'm not saying women should be treated as lesser then men but different, yes, because they are different from men.
Well I think we can dump all ourother preconceptions under the pretext of equality. I think we understand that it is not true - posters are not all equal on this site, but one treats them equally until they individually give us reason to do otherwise.
Quoting TheMadFool
So how should women be treated differently? On this site too?
I understand. I can't stress how important equality is. I see it as fight against discrimination which is irrational.
However, there are many factual difference between men and women. Men are physically stronger, for example. Where physical strength is a requirement (like in the army) it would be stupid to say men and women are equal. This isn't discrimination because it isn't irrational.
On some matters we can achieve parity but in some cases it's simply impossible.
This is not true. There are many, many women stronger than me, for example. It is exactly the sort of thing that is irrational. Let us suppose you have reason to separate a bunch of people into stronger and weaker halves. Which method would be rational, (a) examine their strength, or (b) examine their genitals?
I don't know about this site, but when a pregnant woman walks in and all the seats are taken do you get up to give the pregnant woman your seat? Men can't get pregnant so...?
Treating people differently does not necessarily mean that you are treating them unequally.
It's not gender neutrality that is the problem (at least from what we've seen so far). It is gender flipping that is the problem. When parents raise their kids as the opposite gender/sex, which is not a gender/sex neutral environment, then we have problems where the kids grow up to be adults that are now confused about their gender/sex (trans).
I'd be grateful if you'd just butt out, Harry, I'm afraid you're not up to this. Where a difference makes a difference, it is foolish to pretend it makes no difference. Thus having darker skin makes one less able to synthesise vitamin D using sunlight. This is one of the few physical effects of skin colour and a perfectly uncontroversial ground for discrimination - give the black guy more fish. Likewise, where there is a real sexual difference, discrimination on the basis of sex is uncontroversial. So if you want to know whether someone is pregnant, it makes sense to consider their sex. On the other hand, if you want to know whether someone needs to sit down, I recommend looking to see if they seem frail or tired, and then maybe asking them.
As to your second comment, you're just trying to change the subject and poison the well.
It's a field where statistics need to be read very carefully, because in matters human, humans are affected by statistics. We have, for example: Statistics to the effect that men are stronger -> expectations that men are stronger -> men are disproportionately encouraged/allowed to take up positions requiring strength -> men exercise more -> men are stronger.
This is not to deny that there is any physiological effect of sex on strength statistically, but to warn that its significance is exaggerated, because of cultural feedback, and the exaggeration tends to become exaggerated, so as to become a barrier to some.
It is only in my grandmother's days that women did not have the vote because they were well known to be irrational, unintelligent and inclined to hysteria, at least until given a hysterectomy. And no doubt the statistics proved it.
The APA isn't a self contained group, interested in staying only in its own lane. They wish to exert political influence.
Well, seeing as their report is supported by 400 scientific references, they have a legitimate right to exert some influence based on its findings imo. That influence is not likely to be decisive given the overall conservative nature of US politics.
Getting back to the Swedish example, which is more interesting to me because it shows what actually happens when theory is put into practice as opposed to what opponents of all things liberal fear will happen, there has been a study (unfortunately not free to access) concerning the results of such policies. Here's a summary of the conclusion:
"While the conclusion suggests we’re genetically prone to immediately ascribe gender categories to others, it also suggests socialized differences can be mitigated. Compared to children from traditional preschools, children from gender-neutral schools were more likely to play with unknown children of another gender — an important finding since, “young children who favor same-gender playmates develop more extreme gender-typed interests and behaviors over time,” the study authors write, citing previous research. The children from gender-neutral schools also held fewer gender stereotypes (e.g., dolls are for girls)."
https://theswaddle.com/the-results-of-extreme-gender-neutral-education/
So problematizing gender categories and acting on that through education policy results, it seems, not in boys and girls not recognizing each other as different, but in:
1) More openness to other genders
2) Fewer gender stereotypes
So, getting back to the OP's hypotheses:
1) To the extent that gender differences are biologically rather than culturally conditioned, gender neutrality in education and wider society will have no effect on personality or identity.
Seems to be borne out by this study re identity at least.
2) To the extent that such differences are culturally conditioned, they are distorting constraints on human freedom, barriers to equality, and potential causes of psychological conflict and trauma.
More controversial. But if one accepts relatively less openness to other genders and more gender stereotypes to be distorting constraints on freedom, to be anti-egalitarian and undesirable psychologically, which seems a not immoderate interpretation, then also borne out.
So, if the fears that gender-neutral schools are a damagingly disruptive form of socialization that perverts our children's genetically programmed understanding of sex differences are wrong, and this form of education merely serves to undermine socialized stereotypes that are a hangover from a less enlightened past, should we not all get on board?
It seems that everyone turns to Sweden to prove whatever liberal proposition they need to, which leads me to believe that it's pretty hard to fuck anything up in Sweden. They live in a homogeneous utopia, where everyone is responsible and hard working and washes and dries their own plates. I think they could remove the locks from their prisons and no one would leave, proving once and for all that locks aren't needed to keep people in.
My issue is that I don't see a problem with boys being boys and girls being girls, so I don't really care to change things. If my boy wanted to play with dolls, and assuming my beating the hell out of him daily didn't adequately deter him (a joke), I'd be fine with it. In truth, I don't care, and I'd love and support my kids just the same, but I don't see any issue with me buying him fire trucks, punching gloves that make explosion sounds, and Nerf guns and not giving him tea sets and dolls. He seems to get along with boys and girls just fine today.
Since we're speaking about politics, we also have to be sensitive to other people's views, even if we think they're scientifically unsupportable. Societal harmony is a goal I'd think, and I don't think that would be achieved by informing all those with religious leanings who find designated male/female roles highly significant that they are to abandon those views and come in tune with the times. As I've said, the issue isn't pressing and the harms not so significant that it requires a marching out of experts to right the ways of the primitive traditionalists once and for all. Why wage this culture war? What do you expect to gain other than polarization? Can you not just let the stupid be stupid? You'll be afforded ample opportunity to smugly declare their stupidity if that's what you need. They're not listening to you anyway.
Are you saying rather than change things for the better, we should do the stupid thing because the stupid people won't listen to us anyway? Seems you sorely lack the—how you say?—American can-do attitude. :victory:
I don't see it as an issue of stupidity anyway, but as a lack of openness, which with time can change. Gay marriage was deemed inconceivable just a generation ago and those advocating it were accused of all the things you accused me (or liberals? or academics?) of above. Anyway, I'm not personally an advocate of gender-neutral schools as yet, but I'm curious about the effects and open to being convinced, and I definitely don't find them as frightening an idea as some do. (So, you can still ask me to come babysit without fear I'll turn your son gay by forcing him to play Barbies. :up: )
Beyond this specific argument, in any case, looms the issue of how culture, even namby-pamby culture, imprints sexual identity and where do we go to get an objective a view as possible on what's desirable in that field? The psychologist? The biologist? The philosopher? There's no point looking for a solution to the culture itself to see what it's already doing because that's what's being problematized. If we're sling-shotting back to our kids a diseased sense of relative sexual identity based on mostly post-pubescent sex differences in a blind self-fulfilling way then something should change. If we've got it right, then it shouldn't. How do we tell the difference? You tell me.
It's a good tactic, but being on my A game today, I won't fall for the tactic of changing my mind for fear of being called unAmerican.
I have no doubt we could force everyone to believe as the liberals, the conservatives, the Jews, the Christians, or even the Muslims. My objection is fairly consistent here, and that is the government really needs to butt out of such things, and maybe pay attention to the fact that Johnny can't read or add. Let's leave to the Baden household how to raise his rugrats and the Hanover house how to raise his. I trust some, probably most, of our educators to educate, but I'm not so trusting in their ability (or really their right) to indoctrinate. You seem very open to the idea that public education ought to be in charge of enforcing government ideology and morality, and I have a bit more of a problem with that. I cringe equally at the idea of my kids being morally advised by Obama as I do Trump.Quoting Baden
The question isn't where we ought get our direction on how kids ought be raised, but who ought be deciding how one should raise one's kids. What I ought to eat for breakfast is a question all sorts of people might best answer for me, but I ought be the one who ultimately decides, even if you think I'm wrong. As long as I'm not clearly causing damage and my decisions not overwhelmingly dangerous, I get to decide how to raise my children. I am quite certain I am a better parent than most, and if my parenting decisions could be imposed on many young families, their children would be propelled to far greater success than they would relying upon the backwards working class values of their parents. I submit that it's far better however to allow others to do as they may, despite the idiocy of their not adhering to the Hanoverian principles of parenting. In fact, I daresay the world would be better off had you been raised by my principles. We'd be spared so much nonsense, and your income would be far greater..
First of all, I agree parenting is up to the parent within legal limits. And advice is just that, advisory. Never said anything to the contrary.
Quoting Hanover
This is a misrepresentation of the debate we're having. Education is ideological one way or the other. Separating boys and girls is as ideological as mixing them; gender non-neutral schools are as ideological as gender-neutral schools. Getting kids to sing the national anthem at school is enforcing an ideology. Banning it in every school would be enforcing a different one. If your contention is that the prevailing ideology is not an ideology because you're blind to it then you're a classic victim of ideology. So, the debate we're having is about education policy, which changes all the time, and characterizing it as a novel attempt to put the government in charge of ideology and morality is just an attempt to wiggle out of the responsibility to actually think about the issues at hand.
There are regular doubts raised about the validity of social sciences, psychology included. A good deal of what passes in the social / behavioral sciences for science is, in fact, doubtable. Psychologists are good at measuring cognitive performance, for instance. They can tell you just how, and to what extent, a traumatic brain injury or disease has impaired mental functioning. Tests and measurements in cognitive functioning (learning, memory, problem solving, etc.) have good validity and reliability measures.
The assessment of personality is a much less solid area of psychology--despite its being the most interesting, or maybe because it is the most interesting. Measuring personality traits is dicey, and the validity and reliability of personality tests is not all that great.
Then when it comes to theorizing about personality, and proposing what a psychologist or psychotherapist should work toward, psychologists can not be unbiased, and nobody else can either. "What are desirable and undesirable human traits?" can not be a neutral question. Psychologists have both an official and unofficial policing function. Sometimes the policing function is specific (psychologists working in forensic settings) but most often the policing function has to do with policing the boundaries between what a psychologist or therapist thinks are acceptable and unacceptable behaviors, as he or she experiences it in the social context. The authors of the APA document would not be free of any of these limitations.
"Psychology" is an professional practice; it is also a business. The profession has needs: maintaining some sort of consistency across hundreds of thousands of practitioners is one need. Maintaining the need for psychologists is also a need. The more deviant conditions that can be identified, the better. Consequently the DSM gets bigger and bigger with every revision.
Professionals--with 1 or 2 expensive post-baccalaureate degrees, and either membership in or aspirations to join the upper middle class--come with class biases too, which may be quite discordant with working class biases.
The upshot: Take the recommendations with numerous grains of salt.
That sounds good to me. But is it not also possible to discuss together why you each think your way is the best?
Quoting Hanover
Well public education has to lean one way or another. It cannot be trying to be gender neutral and support gender stereotypes, and my guess is that you want it to go on with the way it is, which is enforcing government ideology, more or less by definition. If I was playing hard ball, I would suggest that gender neutrality as described is rather refraining from imposing an ideology of what character is appropriate to each sex.
They who claim to be gender neutral are probably lying, quite possibly to themselves as well as to others.
If we really are leaving it to the Badenses and Hanovers to raise their children as they see fit, then there is no reason to discuss which one is the best. If the Badenses end up beating their children, and the Hanovers regularly send their children to bed without supper, we'll just have to let the blood spatter and malnutrition fall where it may.
Oh no they're not! Those who claim that They who claim to be gender neutral are probably lying, quite possibly to themselves as well as to others, are probably lying, quite possibly to themselves as well as to others.
Quoting Baden
@Hanover ? @Bitter Crank ?
Do people claim to be gender neutral?
I thought they aspired to be gender neutral.
Just as people of goodwill aspire to be non-racist, while recognising that they probably still have some elements of racism in their persona because it is so natural in the human condition.
To the extent that things like racism or gender-neutrality are seen as moral issues (and I see them that way), surely any thoughtful person that considers them a worthy goal will express them as an aspiration and encourage others to aspire towards it too. Only a fool will claim 'I am perfect, so try to be like me!'
Upon whatever plinth we are precariously perched, I propose we are probably preaching to the persnickety practitioners of professional nit picking. I want the whole pillar.
Quoting unenlightened
OK, OK, but people do rather regularly lie to themselves and others.
Gender neutrality has more to do with avoiding certain kinds of binary and isolation. It's not a supposition that people don't have gender or preferences in their behaviour, likes, etc. All it's really doing is decoupling the idea certain behaviours or preferences are the exclusive nature of one gender or another.
It doesn't actually mean people have "neutral" gender and no personal preferences which fit with some stereotypical accounts/myths of gender.
Well put, but I am not enthusiastic about this decoupling.
Hey, I'm 72. At some point one has to decide which cutting edges to sit on, and which cutting edges to avoid. Decoupling sex and gender roles is too edgy at this point. Once upon a time the idea was more attractive than it is to me now. In the first flush of gay liberation -- early 1970s -- this sort of thinking was de regueur. Many flushes later, 40 years worth, I'm tired of the topic
How will all this come out in the wash? Most individuals are going to track standard heterosexual gender/sex role stereotypes and live happily ever after. Some people, some of them homosexuals, are likely to trip over stereotypes until they can sort out the variables. Most gay men are going to do what most gay men do now -- adjust standard heterosexual male stereotypes to homosexuality and live happily ever after. (I don't speak for dykes--waaay too risky.)
There aren't really any stereotypes though, just people being themselves (or not, as the case might sometimes be). Decoupling doesn't really mean anything in terms of how people behave, apart from avoiding essentialist associations between a gender and some sort of preference or behaviour. In terms of a behaviour or liking something, there is no impact. All that is taken away is: "Men are like X, Women like Y." No-ones actual preferences are at stake.
The stereotypes are self-sustaining myth. People make the mistake of confusing their preferences for a notion/rule of where they belong. They walk away under the illusion to be of a preference means they must of a gender prescribed in a stereotype.
In the process, it forms an illusion that someone's preferences are being attack. Much as we've seen in this thread, where gender neutrality is mistaken for some notion of everyone being genderless and not having any sort of individual preference.
I am much more of an essentialist than a constructionist, so essentialist associations are not something I would be anxious to avoid.
But, we are not so genetically programmed that there is no room for a range of behaviors to exist.
Quoting TheWillowOfDarkness
What do you mean, "there aren't any stereotypes"? Your statement is contrary to the facts. Lots of stereotypes exist, some positive, some negative, and they seem to be quite influential.
Another pointless non-response based on venting your own prejudice.
There is nothing prejudiced about it. The gist of the post is live how you want and leave others alone. How is that prejudiced, especially when Hanover is saying the same thing and you aren't getting upset about that (hypocrisy)? I even pointed out that the human race is one culture. How is that prejudice? Wipe the bullshit from your eyes.
Why don't you point out the problem areas of my post instead of engaging in ad hominem attacks? Of course that's much easier than actually having to address your inconsistencies that I pointed out. I'd love to see you address the first question in my post. That is a legitimate question, no?
No, because you've missed the context of my conversation with Hanover on what's being problematized and in which culture.
And the rest of your post is an irrelevant rant.
So if you want to respond on the basis of what I wrote, e.g.
Quoting Baden
Quoting Baden
Go ahead.
The rest isn't a rant at all. It's pointing out the inconsistency of the "progressives" in their arguments for gender neutrality and their arguments for transgenderism. Again, what many call "liberals" and "progressives" aren't liberal or progressive at all. They are authoritarian socialists. Like you and un, they want to push a certain way of living on others.
The first thing neuroscience shows is neuroplasticity. London cabbies have to learn the knowledge and it changes their brains. Which is what one might have expected really, and means that brain studies cannot distinguish innate from learned roles so easily. There is a ton and a half of social psychology studies on this, but for the purposes of this thread, one can simply assume that if mens' and womens' brains operate differently, then treating them the same in childhood will not affect that because that is what it means for a difference to be innate rather than culturally induced.
Quoting TheWillowOfDarkness
(my bold)
What I am wanting to contrast here is the American culture that seems to be highly gendered and gender prescriptive, and adversarial, with the playing down of gender differences in Sweden. It seems to me that the whole tone of the debate in the US is overheated and ideological, and is putting great pressure on folks to conform or else to rebel to an extreme. But what seems to happen is that even the idea of reducing the conflict and relaxing the rigidity of the stereotypes is taken as a threat to gender and part of a campaign to emasculate and defemminise.
. https://www.ipsos.com/en/node/392831
These are amongst the people, (and gays used to be, but have carved something of a niche for themselves) who suffer from the contradiction between what they are, and what what they are is supposed to be. They suffer both from the internal conflict of identity and the often physical persecution of a rigidly coercive society.
I am a man. Therefore however I behave is manly behaviour.
Men behave thus and so. Therefore anyone who does not behave thus and so is not a proper man.
Therefore I am not a proper man, therefore I have the wrong body.
Well, let's properly represent things. The grand Swedish experiment appears to be limited to a handful of pre-school schools comprised of 1 to 2 year olds where the teachers let boys dance and play with dolls and girls were encouraged to yell "NO!" and be boisterous. It also looks really cold there. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/24/world/europe/sweden-gender-neutral-preschools.html.
I find it very hard to believe those schools had any lasting impression on the kids, but I'd assume the parents who choose to send their kids to such schools did. If the Baden kids went to school in rural Mississippi, despite however backwards their views might be, I'd suspect they'd come out sounding a whole lot like papa Baden, largely because years of attempted indoctrination through the schools can be unraveled with a single well timed eye roll from dad.
In terms of what gender enforcement is occurring in our schools today, it certainly isn't through a formalized effort. I'm sure the schools are reflective of society in general and there's de facto gender role enforcement, but I can't recall a class where the teachers taught boys how to be proper boys and girls proper girls. Had a girl wished to take wood shop in highschool, she could have. We had one such pioneer in my woodshop class.
So what exactly do you propose we change here? Are you proposing some formalized indoctrination class?
And, for the record, American students don't sing the national anthem each morning. They say the Pledge of Allegiance. I suppose that is indoctrination, enforcing the controversial idea that Americans be American.
I suppose if the topic came up, as it did here, in a generally open discussion format, there would be value to such discussion. I'm not sure how the subject is broached among neighbors about what might be the best way to raise one another's respective children. I also don't think the topic would generally arise in a benign educational context, but it would arise by those who wished to alter public policy.Quoting unenlightened
What are the schools doing now to enforce gender roles? I see it in sports for obvious reasons, but within the educational environment, where do you see it? I also don't concede the point of necessary bias, as in the schools must either be enforcing gender neutrality or gender role play. They could accept a neutral role (the very topic of this discussion is neutrality after all), meaning they don't care what the kids do. The question of how boys ought to be is just not something the schools even need to address.
No, here's what actually happens. The schools stop teaching the basic nuts and bolts about the world and decide their role is social engineering. This results in the election of officials who decide to either teach us the world were created in 6 glorious days and then others who wish to teach us that boys and girls are all the same but for a few anatomical variations. That then results in explosions of home schooling, church based schools, tuition vouchers, and school choice allowances so that society can further segregate. What you get when you enforce these ideas isn't harmony, but just reassurance by the right that the left has gone off the deep end and reassurance by the left that the right is committed to living in the dark ages. Then you get Trump. Congratulations. Trump is your fault, not mine. You made me vote for him.
I don't know. Do they have different uniform requirements, maybe? But roles can be supported without being enforced, by simply treating the genders differently.
Quoting Hanover
That is ridiculously naive. Education has always been about social engineering, you are simply using it as a negative because it might engineer change. What do you think nuts and bolts are used for?
Most private schools wear uniforms, but few public school do (and I have been previously informed that public and private are used in the reverse in the UK than in the US. Public means government run in the US). I'd think though that a boy could wear a skirt in today's climate.
But I do think we need to figure out specifically what we're asking be changed, else we really don't know what we're arguing about. IQuoting unenlightened
I'm referencing the misuse of schools to teach a particular ideology. How does teaching math, for example, do that?
You need some perspective. If American culture is highly gendered and adversarial and the debate is overheated and ideological, then what would you call what would happen if you suggested Iran change their culture? There are far worse extremes in the treatment of women vs men in other cultures - differences that I would call unequal. American culture is one of the most open cultures on the planet. You seem to think that any questioning of your ideas is overheated and ideological (and silly).
Quoting unenlightened
... in a myriad of small ways, ignoring, ridiculing, one sex, and encouraging the other. By simply assuming that girls aren't usually as good at maths, or that they're not as interested, or that they won't need it, by not challenging such expressions when they are expressed by pupils. Again, one does not put the dominant ideology on the curriculum because it pervades the ethos of the school. One does not teach gender stereotypes because they pervade everything one teaches. Your maths question is silly, and I have given it far more notice than it deserves.
Should we abolish one-gender schools? Or should that remain an option?
Many of these behaviors are instilled in people before they get to grade school. It starts in the home. Your first few years of life are where you adopt your norms for the rest of your life.
We currently have a common expectation of math skills for boys and girls. There is no difference in grading for boys and girls. I don't know what you're talking about. My daughter doesn't get graded nor do I expect less of her than from my boys in math.
This is uncontroversial. No one is supportive of ignoring, ridiculing, and discouraging anyone, and no school I know of believes girls should be excluded from math class. So what is it that we're disagreeing about? I was assuming there'd be some rule in some administrative handbook that would be changed after we instituted our gender neutrality polices, but it doesn't sound like there is one.
To the extent that girls are being treated like second rate citizens, I'm as concerned as anyone. I just don't know what real life rule will be affected by this.
Quoting unenlightened
If you say so. My objection remains though, and I don't see how we'll change the math curriculum in a gender neutral society, not do I see how adding and subtracting numbers enforces gender bias. I get how excluding girls from such enterprises would, but I am opposed to such things.
Nor does anyone else in the whole wide world. That's why it's so silly.
What un said, plus: About the first thing that's done when designing a curriculum is that the underlying ideological basis is decided on. You will be pained to know, I'm sure, that these days that is usually some form of liberal humanism (which is why teachers are not supposed to hit your kids, scream at them or force boring rote-learned work down their throats). And that ideological basis has developed over the years, which is largely why education now in the West is, thankfully, very different from what it was a hundred years ago. So, the social engineering is happening all the time; it's called education policy. And it's never just about neutrally teaching nuts and bolts. There is no perfect neutral standpoint. So, obviously ideological forces fade into the background when you take them for granted, but we're always immersed in them regardless.
Quoting Harry Hindu
So, who is your foil here? Who is saying that gender-neutral schools are necessarily and unqualifiedly a good thing? What your interlocutors are attempting is more like exploring the grounds on which the subject could be meaningfully debated. What we're getting back in return is an attempt to shut things down on the basis of buzzwords like "authoritarian socialism" etc. So, maybe they represent progress. Maybe not. Shouldn't we explore how we would find the answer to that question?
That was supposed to be reverse psychology, dummy.
That is what the free market system is for. Make it an option for parents to try or not. It shouldn't be a requirement or even experimented with in the public school system.
What I don't get is how we would apply this gender-neutral idea to all these new "genders" that have cropped up. If we are to use gender-neutral pronouns then why were all of these other "gender" names invented as if we are suppose to recognize all these new "genders". What exactly is it that we are suppose to recognize if not the physical differences between males and females?
Speaking of shutting down meaningful debate - whenever the left's definition of "gender" is questioned, what we get back is an attempt to shut things down on the basis of buzzwords like "hater", or "bigot", or "prejudiced". The fact is that this very debate the OP is based on is questionable - namely your definition of "gender".
What I said.Quoting Baden
This isn't what I'm referring to. If screaming at kids and using rote learning worked, I'd be in favor of it. When my son was young, I would slap his head as he did his math homework, explaining that if he could work under such conditions, real life would be a breeze. I'll have you know, he's a straight A physics major right now. My results have even been published. I mean I'm right now publishing them here, so I think that counts.
What I'm referring to is having teachers teach a political ideology like it's fact. A teacher can teach socialism, but not that socialism is good. Once she does that, kids start getting taught at home that their teachers are idiots. This assumes every home is like mine, and that seems a safe assumption.
What if Johnny tells his teacher that he feels like a girl and then puts on "girl" clothes? Does the teacher tell Johnny, "No, Johnny you don't have to be a girl to wear those clothes. Girls and boys can wear any clothes. You are not a girl. You are a male that can wear whatever clothes he likes." Is that appropriate response? Or do we tell "her" that you don't have to wear those clothes to feel like a girl, you can still wear those clothes you have on and be a "girl". What would be the appropriate response in a gender-neutral environment? Surely, pointing out the fact that someone is a male or female isn't the same as treating them differently because of that fact. How I treat someone is separate from what they are, or else what are we discussing if not one's identity as opposed to how they are treated as a result of what they are?
If we treat people the same, then we erase their individual identities. Treating people differently is what gives them their individual identity, right un?
Alright, so we leave math alone in a gender neutral society. The only thing I've seen that's in need of change is how we are to let our kids play in preschool when they are 1 and 2 years old. Most 1 and 2 year olds are pretty limited in their conversations and understandings of things, and many haven't yet mastered such skills as walking and not spitting out their Cheerio's, let alone understanding the differences among the genders.
I didn't see that bit where someone, anyone at all, said gender neutrality only applies to preschool. Remind me.
The Swedish study as described in the NY Times article I cited above seemed to relate to 1 and 2 year olds. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/24/world/europe/sweden-gender-neutral-preschools.html.
? Who's suggesting putting socialism in the junior school curriculum?
Right, I see, so you thought this conversation was about teaching Karl Marx to toddlers.
His link said nothing about Karl Marx. I think you and un, are the extremists here. When you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.
When did you expect to teach gender-neutrality to a person - when they are old and grey - when they are already set in their ways? At what point in a person's development were you implying that we teach gender-neutrality? Where in these Swedish studies do they ever mention what they do with the bathroom situation in a "gender"-neutral school?
One might say that I'm confusing sex with gender. I say that I'm not. That would have to be settled before we could even begin to debate the topic in the OP. The fact is that, like the idea of "god", "gender" hasn't been defined as anything meaningful or coherent, other than being a synonym for "sex".
But there is no suggestion at all that this is anything separate from or antithetical to general education and general social policy in the country.
Nobody is suggesting teaching socialism the subject as Hanover implied. And we can't even get started on the debate as to whether gender neutrality should be applied (rather than taught as a subject) because you two refuse even to consider how we can determine under what circumstances any change in the treatment of gender might be countenanced in education. You instead presume that un and I are all for it by default because "authoritarian socialism" or whatever. And when it's pointed out that your presumption is wrong and you're not reading properly, you double down. So, let's just leave it at that.
Read it again. That was just an example he gave as to how we should handle teaching gender-neutrality to children. The fact of it's existence should be discussed and mentioned, but placing value judgements on political ideologies (gender-neutrality is part of a political ideology) is not what teachers should be doing, and I've already mentioned several times that your presumption of "gender" is wrong - which is why we have nonsensical discussions like this.
And we have considered it. We (or at least I) said that it can be experimented with in a private institution, not in the public schools. Because you aren't happy with that is what makes me think that you want more - that you want everyone to live the way you think is "right".
I've not mentioned Marx, but usually Marx isn't far behind in these conversations about gender. It usually goes down as some argument that the existing power structure is wanting to maintain its control over its resources to subjugate the masses, all having been brought about by capitalist greed. Removing gender based pronouns is somehow the first step in pushing against the power structure. No longer will I be benefited by having a penis, and so I fight viciously to protect my power position.
I did not suggest that. I suggested that gender neutrality issues were ideological issues, and like socialism (another such example), should not be taught from an advocacy perspective.
Nice cross post.
It depends who you're talking to, really. Marxist discourse can actually be pretty against what it sees as 'identity politics', though instead of complaining about liberals using it in a way that undermines civil liberties, they complain about liberals using it in a way that undermines the class identity of the proletariat.
Gender performativity and Marxism don't have to go hand in hand, there's no conceptual necessity between one and the other, it's just a statistical correlation of leftist ideals.
It doesn't help that 'postmodern Marxism' is a dead horse trope, I guess it's better to call it a zombie horse at this point.
Only one? I guess that must be because females are allergic to wood. Just another of those biological thingies we don't have to worry about. Anyway, we're done.
If a girl decides not to take wood shop, is it a result of her own personal preference, or only because of some kind of societal pressure? How can you know? I havent heard of any stories where a girl that wanted to take wood shop couldn't.
[My italics]
Now you've stumbled on the type of question that I've been trying to ask you to consider for the entire discussion. Seeing as you're now asking me, maybe you'll attempt an answer. An effort which might actually lead somewhere. I'll leave you to it.
This is a philosophy forum, is it not? You're welcome to give us your take on "toxic femininity" that is so sorely lacking from public discourse.
Yeah, social pressure only takes the form of people physically stepping in front of you and telling you "you can't do that". Case closed.
I have, alas, concluded that this is not enough of a philosophy forum to cope with this topic, a fear which I expressed in the op. So I have indeed closed the case for my own part. But I am not going to be dogmatic about it, and if you or anyone wants to bring forward something of interest, I will still be following, and will try to respond.
I think it would be more apt to say that this forum is not insulated from the culture war mentality that has spread around the internet.
And, what if a high percentage of the visitors to this forum were from Saudi Arabia. How would that alter the conversation, if at all?
Why not? There are 300 lb women, are there not? Why couldn't a 300 lb linebacker suffer from gender dysmorphia?
Are you imagining gender-neutralized football?
Quoting Arkady
Probably could. I was just wondering how the issue of gender neutrality relates to him, if at all. Does it promise greater freedom? Or does it end up meaning nothing? A linebacker could have the ability to see the humanity of other people rather than just seeing gender. But there are environments in which people are thoroughly and emotionally cast into gender roles. Consider the recent addition to the Supreme Court and his experiences in school. Sports environments are sometimes worse than what was on display there. Recall Trump's comment about "locker-room" talk. What is the inertia behind all of that? Nature or nurture?
BTW, I'm not going to engage in the virtue-signalling that has been rampant in this thread.
No. I assumed that the linebacker in question was a biological male, as virtually all high school football programs are exclusively male.
I assume your linebacker is supposed to exemplify in a non-gender-neutral society, a man who conforms to the stereotype of masculinity. If there were no such stereotype, there would still be such men, but we would not call them 'masculine' and some other, ( pick your own cliche) 'effeminate'.
I'd like to draw attention to something I wrote earlier trying to characterise the difference from the subjective viewpoint, between gender neutrality and gender stereotyping. It passed without comment.
Gender neutrality allows that your linebacker, Stephen Hawking, unenlightened the gobshite weakling, and Bitter Crank the gay icon, are all equally men, and thus equally masculine, no matter how many women we are not stronger than, or how we choose to waste our time.
He's also black and raised by his grandmother. His father is in prison.
Don't worry, I'm just thinking about it.
No. Nature and the fact that you have a penis, which is different than a woman, who has a vagina, is what allows you all to be equally men.
Mine wasn't an aruement from hypocrisy. I'm saying that the application of his arguement is inconsistent. He's essentially preaching to the choir. Think of it this way: you go to the emergency room with a splinter in your finger and a bullet in your chest. The doctor thinks that the splinter is the more serious threat and completely ignores the bullet wound. Unenlightened simply isn't being intellectually honest or consistent.
I will inform the Language Police all over the world to remove gendered constructions, people all over France need to know that whether a river has a vagina or not depends on whether they're talking about the bit flowing into the sea vs it being inland. Sailors all over the world no longer must furiously masturbate into socks when they can just fuck the boat beneath them. This will be incomprehensible to those who speak Tagalog, however, who must suffice with the usual biological bits - at least before their language was changed through their interactions with the Spanish. Eunuchs are no longer male, hallelujah!
There is an extra dimension of gender surplus to the biological ones, which are certainly still relevant. Their relevance is echoed by the relevance of the words 'trans', and the distinctions between 'girl' and 'XX genotype' (see XX male syndrome) and so on. The etymology of gendered words (and tropes) goes further back than contemporary understanding of biology, we should not be surprised to find mismatches between the two in correct use.
It isn't us who're misunderstanding gender, it's you who are misunderstanding language and normativity.
Just as a point of convenience, if you highlight a section from someone's post (from top to bottom of the desired section), you can click the 'quote' button that appears in the prompt and it will also notify them that you have responded, and any of your readers can click on the quote to see exactly what you're quoting from. Such tags make conversations much easier to follow.
- @Hanover
But it is safe to assume that it is OK to teach capitalism and proper gender roles from an advocacy perspective, right? If not, then nearly all of my teachers would be in trouble. See the problem? You did not think your teachers were advocating for anything, but that is only because you were in favor of what was being advocated. I believe that unenlightened can go a little too far sometimes, but surely they have some valid points.
I think I have firm grasp of language as I have been able accumulate 1.7k posts without much of a problem. The only problem I seem to be having is with the way in which you are using a certsin term - "gender". I have defined it as the equivalence of sex. You have yet to provide a consistent definition for your use of the term.
If someone calls thenselves a man and puts on pants while another calls themselves a man puts on a skirt, then they're confusing the wide variety of human behavior as gendered behavior. Humans of any gender can where whatever they like. It is different cultures that place limitations on behavior based on sex, or some other trait. That doesn't mean that you are a woman only when you wear a skirt. It just means that different ciltutes have different guidelines for how to behave. If a man can wear what he wants and a woman can wear what they want then that just makes those terms, "man" and "woman" meaningless. Wearing what you want isnt a man or woman thing. Its a human thing. The distinction is their sex organs that make a man a man or a woman, a woman.
What you don't realize is the trans people would be oppressed in a gender neutral environment. They want gender-specific pronouns applied to them - the opposite ones than their sex would lead one to use - and get hostile when you don't use the "right" one. Men who feel like women (whatever that means) want to wear a dress to express their womanhood, but in a gender neutral environment wearing a dress isn't a characteristic of womanhood and they wouldn't be a woman simply by wearing a dress. It would require more and you seem conrent just to accept theyre claim, yet I dont see you accepting other claims so easily based on somones feeling. Its nothing but illogical, emotional arguments being made from left's side.
I assume you mean 'sex' rather than 'gender' here.
The way that this conversation relates to him is that in a world in which gender stereotypes were not promoted, this male would be free to wear lipstick, dresses, play with dolls and other activities that gender stereotypes claim are 'feminine' without fear of being judged or otherwise looked-down on by others.
His ability to play American football well is one property that is part of a male gender stereotype (by the way, that stereotype no longer applies to English football (soccer) or Australian football, in which there are popular and prosperous female leagues), but implies nothing about other aspects of his behaviour.
But that's an alternate reality. I think that introducing gender neutrality into schools would be icing spread on a shit cake from his point of view. Or at least he'd be aware that those making the changes think of him as part of a shit cake.
He has to lift himself up.
If you're saying that programs in schools do not help a person that is currently suffering persecution because of the gender stereotypes held by others, I don't think anybody disagrees. But nobody is saying that school programs are the whole solution, only that they may be an important part of the solution. Solutions to social problems like this are complex and multi-faceted. Some parts - like the schools - will address the gradual removal of the stereotypes, and others will seek to protect people that currently suffer from those stereotypes. Inevitably, the experience of a nonconformist will be worse now or in five years than it will be in twenty years.
Whats the difference? I've asked this several times. If was so easy and obvious then why can't anyone answer the question?
Quoting andrewk
But a transgender woman (a man claiming to be a woman) does call those things feminine. It is the only way they know how to express their womanhood. Are you telling the trans person that those things are not characteristics of womanhood?
Quoting andrewk
So in a gender neutral school the girls will play on the varsity tackle football team or wrestling team with the boys?
I'm surprised that nobody has answered it, because I believe it is very simple. Perhaps you didn't ask it quite as directly before.
For me, 'sex' refers to the biological sex of the person, as determined by their chromosomes and genitalia. If the chromosomes are not in one of the two standard sexual configurations or the genitalia are not consistent with the chromosomes, the person is intersex. That occurs sometimes, but rarely.
'Gender' identifies with which of society's two standard sets of behavioural expectations the person most complies, or society expects them to comply.
Sex is biological. Gender is a societal expectation based on sex.
I agree with Simone de Beauvoir that gendered expectations are oppressive and that it is worth working to eradicate them. That will take a very long time, and will encounter resistance, but it is worth the effort.
Some people use 'gender' as a synonym for 'sex', and even prefer it because it sounds less rude. I think that is a mistake and, wherever possible refuse to fill in a field in a form marked 'gender' (or choose the 'prefer not to disclose' or 'indeterminate' option if there is one), while I am perfectly happy to indicate my sex.
Although I think it is a mistake, I confess that I made it for much of my life, before I became aware of the importance of the distinction.
Quoting Harry Hindu Sure, if they want to.
Quoting Harry Hindu
I would not presume to tell the person anything, as I am not in a position to understand their experience, much less give them advice. It has to be acknowledged that in some cases gender dysphoria of the sort you mention can come into conflict with de Beauvoir's vision of feminism, and this has caused some distress on both sides. So it behoves us to proceed carefully in areas that are vulnerable to that conflict. But I think it is possible to work to dismantle societal gender expectations without having to enter that conflict zone.
I agree with that. I think we're talking about different things. You're talking about transgenderism, I think. I was talking about a family format that conflicts with the social ideal and the challenges facing a person who for various reasons seems locked into a certain identity.
A sort of principle emerges: no one can give you your freedom. You have to take it. I dont think that principle could be added to a curriculum, but if it could be, it would be a positive approach where gender neutrality seems like an attack; a negative approach.
Well, it wasn't in the form of a question. It did make a direct statement that "gender" hasn't been defined as anything coherent or consistent.
Quoting andrewk
Thank you.
So "gender" is how others treat you. In other words, it has to do with the behavior of others, and/or the ideas of others, but not you as a person. Based on your definition, "sex" is a characteristic of you and "gender" is a characteristic of a society or culture. So it doesn't make sense for a person to say that they want to "change their "gender". It would make more sense to say that they want to change society's "gender" - which is what gender neutrality is trying to do.
Another thing is that "womanhood" would refer to how others, or society treats females, not some feeling that a person has. It wouldn't make sense (using your definition) for a transgender to say "I feel like a woman" with "woman" referring to some feeling that they have. To a transgender, "womanhood", or "gender" is a feeling about themselves, not an expectation of others. The expectation is the antithesis of their gender.
Quoting andrewk
What are some of the expectations of the United States culture that are enforced by laws? Don't we already have laws for the unequal treatment of anyone? What more do you want? It seems to me that by changing the way society expects different people to behave, you'd be changing society's gender (according to your definition).
Quoting andrewk
But I thought this was all about trying to not be rude and offensive and here you come along and say that it's okay to be rude and offensive. You're basically saying that people need to get over the idea of words being offensive and that we should be able to use words that we choose despite how others might feel about it. I couldn't agree more.
Quoting andrewk
I think the way you're thinking about gender now is a mistake and the result of a mass delusion.
Quoting andrewk
So in a gender-neutral society you would only enforce heterosexuals to use gender-neutral pronouns when referring to each other but when referring to a trans person we have to use gender specific pronouns? Isn't that inconsistent for a gender neutral society? It also sounds to me like you are pushing for special treatment, not equal treatment, of trans people.
So it seems to me that both your definition of "gender" and your concept of gender-neutrality would actually go against transgenders' ideas about "gender" and would therefore be oppressive to them. And here you all have been bashing me for just asking questions - trying to get at something coherent and meaningful.
Well it is an attack on stereotypes, not on individuals. But you have hit upon the reason for all the resistance to something that would otherwise be uncontroversial, which is that people don't just conform to but also identify with stereotypes. As soon as one talks about 'manly virtues' and complementary 'womanly virtues', one declares the superior virtue of the manly man over the womanly man, and of the womanly woman over the manly woman. And at this point, one can start to talk about 'privilege'. Cue another bout of outrage.
What is a stereotype of not the idea, or a belief, that a person has? Stereotypes don't exist independent of people's minds, so it would be an attack on a person's beliefs, or ideas. If you're an idealist, then you are your ideas. I think that there are a lot of people who don't integrate all of their ideas (metaphysical, political, scientific, moral, etc.) into a consistent whole, which is why we get inconsistencies across many different topics - something I have tried to point out but then my posts get deleted for being "off-topic".
Another reason the outrage is misplaced, of course, is that gender non-neutral vs gender neutral is not an absolute binary. Education has been trending towards gender neutrality in the West for generations in line with social changes empowering women. So, it's more a matter of following that trend a bit further rather than making some massive jump. Plus, as mentioned early on, according to the research, it seems to have fairly mild effects which are heavily mitigated by the culture as a whole.
Before I get strawmanned again, I'll reiterate I'm not yet a supporter of the move, not to mind some kind of rabid liberal social engineer of the kind dreamed up by some of the less constructive posters on this thread, but consider it worthy of exploration. I mean, why not? Where's all the fear and loathing coming from?
There are environments where women are frequently central to the home. In the case of my linebacker, it's his grandmother. He's not going to grow up to be a grandmother, though. That's why we have to consider who his father is to understand his outlook.
Anyway, a theme video for this thread to convey the cosmic size of some of the individuals on the scene:
Define "I", "have", "equivalence", "consistent", "certain", "defined", "language", "able" etc. We generally do not need definitions to talk plainly about things, and certain words - like language, game, object, culture, ability and so on are quite resistant to exhaustive and exclusive characterisations/definitions.
Nevertheless, by means of a guideline, in case you don't actually understand what I mean by gender and sex, sex is a property of a body determined by the presence of typical reproductive organs and other biological properties in the population. Females typically have wombs, vulvas, clitorises, ovaries, XX chromosomes and so on. Males typically have penises, testicles, developed facial hair and so on. There are edge cases, as I highlighted with XX male syndrome, and these people (as @andrewk) pointed are usually called 'intersex'.
Instead of focussing on my definition of sex and gender, let's look at a neutral institution's treatment of the term - the WHO. The WHO defines gender as:
[quote=WHO]Gender refers to the socially constructed characteristics of women and men – such as norms, roles and relationships of and between groups of women and men.[/quote]
and adds:
It further clarifies the distinction between sex and gender in its term glossary page:
Note here that they explicitly include qualifying phrases to indicate that they are also discussing trans people, their rights, opportunities and so in with their account. A key term they use in characterising comparative advantages that one gender may have over another are '(gender based) differential exposure to risk factors':
though there are other concepts they use in their assessment of gender in a society, culture, institution or other social structure (note the relevance of this to the definition of gender as a social construction). Through their assessments, they have a guideline scale that they use to assess the the social structure's attitude towards gender and how they manage, mitigate or incorporate relative advantages and disadvantages arising from gender. The scale goes from 1 to 5, where 1 is 'gender unequal, 2 is 'gender blind', 3 is 'gender sensitive', 4 is 'gender specific' and 5 is 'gender transformative'.
The debate in this thread, and with you really, occurs when a social structure we share is on the precipice of transition from 2 to anywhere above it - which the WHO believes is a good thing by the way. The starting point, 2 is:
which, if I have read you correctly, you emphasise the first bullet point very strongly because of your firm belief in the fourth bullet point. You seem aware of the third bullet point in your contrasts from typical western societies and institution to places like Iran and Saudi Arabia, and you are resisting the idea that being 'gender blind' actually 'very often reinforces gender-based discrimination'.
This was covered in the thread in the discussion between @Hanover, @Baden and others. The key points of contrast were that progressive political interventions were seen as intrusive applications of ideology by one side of the argument, while the other attempted to highlight that the current state of affairs is already an intrusive application of the ideology of gender norms. This is partially why a 'gender blind' attitude on a societal or institutional level actually maintains harmful gender norms - it sees interventions against them as unjustified, and the very means by which we would justify such interventions in terms of the attempt to increase fairness is stymied by the application of current fiat (like legal or contractual) equality.
This level of understanding of gender is deemed as decidedly suboptimal by the WHO, that well known biased and illogical postmodern neomarxist organisation. The stages after it mirror the perspectives expressed by @Baden, @andrewk and others.
I have no idea how you could maintain that gender is an inconsistent concept without satisfactory characterisation, and how you could maintain ignorance about the stakes involved in progressive politics about gender when the WHO has already done all this work for you, and explicitly includes trans issues among gender ones. It is also written in largely non-technical language, and they they provide an extremely clear conception of gender and what's at stake in interventions to promote gender equality and sensitivity.
If we aren't using the same definitions then we are simply talking past each other, which is a waste of my time.
See my reply to andrew on this page.
Quoting fdrake
Strange. I thought it would be different for a gender-neutral society. A gender-neutral society would want to be blind to gender - not notice it - not refer to it - not make the distinction between genders (not use gender-specific pronouns). To be color-blind is to treat others equally regardless of their race. To be gender-blind is to treat people equally regardless of their gender.
For me gender is a characteristic of an individual, or more specifically the sex of the individual. For you and the left (I should let everyone know that I'm not on the right. I consider myself as a-political), it is the characteristic of a society and is the antithesis of how a transperson uses the term - to refer to a characteristic about themselves as an individual.
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/gender
Either of the two sexes (male and female), especially when considered with reference to social and cultural differences rather than biological ones. The term is also used more broadly to denote a range of identities that do not correspond to established ideas of male and female.
My explanation wasn't complicated at all. It was an explanation about the implications of your own definition - something you don't seem to think about.
Quoting Baden
This part shows that "gender" is arbitrary and therefore meaningless independent of some subjective idea of gender. I could make up any identity and call it "gender". It also contradicts the previous sentence in your definition.
Listen, please. It's not my definition. It's not a left-wing definition. It's the standard definition. It's what the word means and how it's used in every discussion in the area on which the OP is focused. If you don't want to recognize it, fine, but in that case, you won't be able to communicate on this topic.
Hm. I wasn't aware that the WHO was a leftist institution. It has a good reputation for non-partisanship and factual accuracy. Which do you think is more likely, really, that a nonpartisan international collaboration of scientists and policy researchers has a research topic which is completely incoherent and they've somehow not noticed it or that you have an inadequate understanding of the issue?
Their research topic is consistent with years of anthropology and social studies on the difference between gender and sex, is consistent with current dictionary definitions of the word 'gender', and uses both lived experiences/first hand sources and statistical techniques to analyse the impact of gender based differential advantages in institutions, societies and cultures... Their definition of gender is commensurate with and informed by this understanding.
I'll trust the WHO rather than you here. I advise others to do the same.
No it means to not treat people unequally based on their gender/sex. We have that and is what I and Hanover has argued, but you are willfully ignorant.
Quoting Baden
Listen to yourself. If it's not your definition then why are you using it? I never said it was a left-wing definition. I said it was an incoherent definition. Can we do without the politics at the moment and just deal the logic of what you are saying?
Quoting Harry Hindu
...
Quoting Harry Hindu
Because I don't make up my own definitions of words, but rely on authorities such as dictionaries, social institutions etc.
Did I not point out the inconsistency? Why can't you defend it? You posted it and are agreeing with it so you must know how to defend it.
and that, Baden is pleading to authority. Again, I ask you to use lay your emotions aside and use your logic.
Scientific definitions aren't written in stone. Haven't you argued that on this forum? More inconsistencies. [mod deletion - one sentence]
Quoting Harry Hindu
You want consistency in definition, you've seen definitions from the WHO and the Oxford English Dictionary that conflict with yours. You're a person on the internet engaging in a-priori speculation about the meaning of words who finds something, gender, incoherent. The WHO and Oxford English dictionary are non-partisan institutions which (1) research the topic unbiasedly and set out a clear definition of gender which is informed by investigation and (2) reflect the actual usage of the word 'gender' and its connotations.
All I see is someone who for some reason wants a clear definition of something but can't recognise one when it's given and painstakingly explained to them. This isn't a limitation of the concept of gender, this is a limitation of your understanding of it. It is not equivalent to sex, either in the common usage of the word or in the senses relevant to the WHO's research.
Right. It's a non-issue. The fact that we talk about it probably reflects the desire to address real gender issues.
I am not aware of any laws in the US or any other developed country that enforce gender norms (unless we count Saudi Arabia as a developed country. Saudi's gender norms are amongst the world's most vicious, and are enforced by law as well as social pressure). In developed countries gender norms are enforced by social rather than legal pressure, as well as by the way people raise children. What I would like to see is the reduction of that social pressure and more people raising their children without placing gendered behavioural expectations on them. As I read it, the second of those is what the APA doc related to.
Quoting Harry Hindu
I don't think it's rude to talk about sex. I was just referring to the fact that there are still plenty of people in the world that think it is, and it is out of ill-advised deference to them that I have in the past said 'gender' when I meant 'sex'. Let's proceed as though I had put quotation marks around "rude" in my earlier post.
Quoting Harry Hindu
I don't want anybody to be forced to use any pronoun they don't want to use.
The idea that people would be so forced is a piece of hysterical nonsense spouted by Jordan Peterson, who claims that Canadian Bill C-16 does that. I have read C-16 and it says nothing of the kind. So either Peterson has very poor comprehension skills or he hasn't actually read the bill or he is being dishonest. He appears a clever chap so I doubt his excuse is poor comprehension skills.
There's space between it being a non-issue and so critical as to merit vitriolic opposition. And of course, there are shades of gender-neutrality to be considered. Doing things like abolishing differences in dress codes between boys and girls and not laying any emphasis on their biological differences in classroom content or practice seem reasonable to me, and I can't see how they would interfere with individual parenting choices. Whether or not that should be taken further and children should be actively encouraged to challenge gender roles (as in girls being taught to be more assertive/aggressive etc) is more debatable. But again, it seems even the most extreme gender-neutral public schooling that's been tried in Sweden doesn't result in anything earth-shattering.
So, what's been reflected here is that:
Quoting unenlightened
Why? Why is it so poisonous? Why are moves towards gender neutrality considered so threatening when the only research done on it suggests only minor effects? Are the opposition even interested in the results? Or is it just a knee-jerk reaction to anything perceived as liberal/feminist/left-wing etc?
You are mistaken because gender neutrality doesn't have a problem with anyone belonging to one gender or another. All it does is decouple necessary traits from a gender binary. Gender neutrality is fine with there being men and women, whether those men and women are trans people or not. It accepts someone belong to a gender in terms of itself. They are their gender, regardless of which particular traits they have.
You are correct to think this is also about sex. Since gender is only itself, it cannot be reduced to having one particular trait or another. This is no limited to behaviours or preferences. It's also true of body parts. Gender is not the only arbitrary category in play. Sex is also an arbitrary category because it a second order social classification.
When say someone belongs to a sex, we aren't describing the body they have. We are sorting them into a certain social category. Describing a body doesn't actually involve this move. If I cite someone body (e.g. the have a penis, these chromosomes, these other characteristics, etc.), they could be in any social category I wanted and it wouldn't affect there body at all.
Someone with a vagina could be categorised as "man," someone with a penis could be category could be categorised as a "woman."Their bodies wouldn't be affected and any one could describe their body perfectly well. Sex is not the body. It's a social category a body is taken to belong to.
Trans people aren't trans on account having to have a particular trait to be a man or woman. They are trans because they are the opposite of what it expected under a certain sex/gender assignment. It's not a description of how they are a man or women. Their "transness" is a reflection of their meaning in terms of binary gender/sex understandings which are present in society.
In a society which understood sex/gender in terms of itself, as the arbitrary social categorisation it is, trans people would not be trans in this respect. They would just be men and women as they are, whether they had a penis or a vagina (or any other trait) because no one would expect them to be otherwise.
But we don't live in that society (at least, not yet), so people want some way of understanding the man with a vagina or the women with a penis in terms of their binary understanding of gender. "Trans" is this marker. It says: "This man/woman is not what I expected given what I think of men/women. They are a different man/woman in this respect."
I don't know what unenlightened meant by that. Do you? And I don't know what specific moves toward gender neutrality we're talking about. What moves? Who made them? Who is the opposition?
The moves, or some of them at least, are outlined in the gender-neutral education article in the OP. By the opposition, I mean those who were opposed to the idea in this thread. and also those who wrote in opposition to the APA guidelines. The latter representing one side of what un was referring to as the "politicised gender war".
From this I took that he meant gender binary expectations were stronger in the US, which puts pressure on people to either confirm against their will or rebel for the sake of defying the oppressive binary. I got he was saying this seems to be the perpetual state of the discussion, to a point where it's impossible to pose a relaxed position that gender doesn't matter to imaging how someone might act or exist. It's seen by proponents gender binary side as destroying men and women.
"State curriculum urges teachers and principals to embrace their role as social engineers, requiring them to “counteract traditional gender roles and gender patterns.”"
That's not going to happen in American public schools. Or I should say, over my dead body it will. That is not the role of public education. Even a small step in that direction would be extremely dangerous. The more benevolent the intention, the greater the danger due to the naivete and hubris of it.
That's just a deeply rooted principle in the US. Christians would love to enter schools and start doing social engineering. So would militant atheists. And the list goes on. The answer to the whole lot of them is: no.
That's not a politicized gender war, though. So un must have been talking about something else.
Stronger in the US than where?
Sounds pretty political to me: "We must ensure that our schools and community reproduces/doesn't change present understandings and expectations of gender."
Sweden, I assume. Or anywhere that takes an active role in downplaying or rejecting gender stereotypes as a social outcome.
The point has already been made earlier in the thread that the teacher is a social engineer one way or the other. Getting kids to say the pledge of allegiance (or whatever) is social engineering. Reinforcing current gender stereotypes is social engineering. Whatever you think about the language used in the quote, education just is social engineering. You can embrace it or deny it. And whether you embrace it or not should depend on the outcome you want. So, for example, if you want less racial discrimination, you actively counteract racial stereotypes, which has been being done for the last few generations. If you want less sexism then you may need to actively counteract sexual stereotypes.
Quoting frank
Knee jerk reaction. Why? What do you fear from the counteraction of traditional gender roles? What exactly do you think the negative outcome is?
You did, in the last post before my response. This part:
You are outright saying that schools (as in the examples of Sweden un was talking out) teaching children not to gender stereotype is one of the greatest threats we could ever face.
What specific measures should be taken to accomplish that?
Quoting Baden
I guess you're less interested in someone else's experiences and views than in finding someone to bitch at. Try Hanover. I'm not interested.
I didn't bitch at you. I said it's a knee jerk reaction, and that's what strong language like "over my dead body" sounds like. Fair or no? The rest was just a few questions.
Equality and equal opportunity are very important. Social engineering in the public schools is not the way to advancement in those areas. And there is no war going on in the US over this issue.
What you tried to suggest is that my concern for protecting students is actually some sort of facade behind which I hide my fear of gender neutrality. Like un, you seem to have x-ray vision into a world you've never visited.
In that case what you're telling me is that you don't understand what social engineering is. As I already explained and as I wouldn't need to explain if you'd read the actual discussion, public education is inseparable from social engineering. It's not some neutral space where nothing ideological happens. If you're against all forms of social engineering then you're against public education, period.
From what?
Maybe it's just the word "social" that's making you all break out in hives. How about we call it public policy application? Because it's essentially the same thing in this context.
Yeah. Peace out.
Sorry frank, but you don't get any brownie points here for fronting that you know stuff.
Here's a basic overview from wiki:
"Social engineering is a discipline in social science that refers to efforts to influence particular attitudes and social behaviors on a large scale, whether by governments, media or private groups in order to produce desired characteristics in a target population. Social engineering can also be understood philosophically as a deterministic phenomenon where the intentions and goals of the architects of the new social construct are realized...
As a result of abuse by authoritarian regimes and other non-inclusive attempts at social engineering, the term has in cases been imbued with a negative connotation. In British and Canadian jurisprudence, changing public attitudes about a behaviour is accepted as one of the key functions of laws prohibiting the behaviour. Governments also influence behavior more subtly through incentives and disincentives built into economic policy and tax policy, for instance, and have done so for centuries."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_engineering_(political_science)
There's a lot more to it than that, but instead of running away, maybe start by telling me what part you think is not going on all the time in the public sphere.
It's a general impression, somewhat supported by some of the reactions on this thread. But what was specifically in my mind was a clip I saw from the secret life of five year olds, in which Harlo from LA expresses some rather rampant sexist views and refuses to play with girls. You may not have access to this and it's not anyway a format I really like - a bit big brother - but it was jarringly out of what I generally expect at that age, and also apparently out of what the other children expect. It looked a bit mad.
Here's a description.
I'm going to have to ask you to place the outdated Black Americana on the floor and slowly back your white ass up away from it. :blush: Just kidding.
I see. :up:
Also some examples of gender identities would be awfully useful in the WHO definition.
Just sounded fly to me... :grimace:
:clap:
You think you are joking?
Watch this, folks, and get some idea of how social pressure works, how identification works, how stereotypes work, and how they are different from biology.
The NHS has a much better definition that refers to experience and how a person feels:
Quoting NHS
Consider this video if you are interested in gender in autism:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bVg855hZOk
That's a reasonable and nuanced criticism.
Harry insists gender is no more than biological sex. The NHS definition is within the general boundaries of the other definitions in recognizing it's more than that. Whether you use the NHS definition or the WHO one or Oxford, you recognize that:
Quoting NHS
Harry doesn't and so is wasting time here. And that's the end of the definition discussion now as it really is too much of a tangent.
I'm a bit confused by how this isn't obvious for everyone. Gender identity science is a real thing, there are tons to read about it, but I think people just ignore it because of their emotional response to the science. In essence; even at a philosophical forum people can't seem to separate their preprogrammed culture and lash out with every bias and fallacy there is.
What I find more interesting, as I don't see how the definitions can be disputed really, is why? Why does some children go through this? Is it nature or nurture? Is it a combination, like most things in psychology? More importantly, how does gender stereotypes in society and also, the active force against those stereotypes play into the nurture of kids? Where is the balance between upholding differences between genders and fighting stereotypes that influence destructive behavior on both the sense of identity and social interactions later in life?
Quoting NHS
Note the 3 terms.
1. sex - biological.
2. gender - undefined.
3. gender identity. A feeling/identification.
Compare: [quote=WHO]Gender refers to the socially constructed characteristics of women and men – such as norms, roles and relationships of and between groups of women and men.[/quote]
This fills in the gap and gives us definitive completion of physical, phenomenological, and social. It seems a pretty consistent terminology to me.
Some people have a revulsion for either that makes them effectively indistinguishable...
Perhaps consideration of currency as a social construct will also illustrate that a social construct is not something one can, as an individual, do anything much about. You want a tin of beans, you need 50 pence. You can say 'I don't believe in money', but the nice man at ASDA won't just let you have a tin of beans for nothing. And when hyperinflation sets in, and the price goes up to £50, it won't do you any good to say 'I don't believe in inflation and offer 50 p for the beans. Social constructs are 'made-up' but they are not voluntary.
1. Madness is physical; a disease/malfunction of the brain.
2. Madness is a social construct: a formal status like criminality, conferred on the individual by society.
3. Madness is subjective, a feeling and an identification.
All three are obviously true in some ways and in some cases, and extremely controversial in others. But perhaps all this is for another time, and another thread.
And of course, what "appropriate" means here is going to be defined in a rather top down manner and schools play a large role in creating a general idea in people's heads about how they she be and what to believe. Pledges of allegiance, emphasis on the ills of national enemies, correct codes of conduct in various settings, gender norms, etc. There's a reason the aforementioned reactionaries in this thread almost immediately jumped to complaining about socialism. That's a product of American social engineering in education and the media. For the latter, there's a reason you see people in the media, government and in the general populace call social Democrats "socialists". They've no conception of the actual range of political views (certainly not any further left than the center-right democrats in America), and so everything becomes socialism to them, just like the current structures tell them to think.
And if the claim is, as a user said earlier on this page, that they don't want any added social engineering to fix (what I take to be) the absurdities produced by American social engineering, then you don't actually care about social engineering in principle. What you actually care about is whether or not that engineering is done in such a way that it protects your ideological views. You don't care if kids are "protected" in this case because you're not suggesting we remove the obvious attempts to mold them into believing and assuming things you agree with.
It's a very convenient hypocrisy to have, I grudgingly admit. Rules for thee, not for me. Bad for you but good for we.
Per Jefferson, the point was to teach people to read so they can educate themselves prior to voting. Does public education end up shaping people for better or worse beyond that? Probably. If you want to call that social engineering, fine by me. I'm strongly against adding anything to the curriculum that's meant to influence students one way or another. Make sure they have what they need to make their own decisions and leave it there.
As Baden mentioned earlier, it's a non-issue anyway. Dwelling on it is to embrace a distraction from real problems, don't you agree?
Me:
Quoting MindForged
Quoting frank
Unless you are arguing to change the current social engineering that already influences students one way or another I don't take this too seriously. It's exactly the blind spot I was pointing at.
OK. I think what you're saying is that since social engineering is already taking place in the schools, there's no reason we shouldn't add more.
So let's open wide the door to that. Let's not just allow gender blurring, let's actively reinforce it. I'd say that once we, as a society have decided to look at things that way, the entities with interest in influencing children will start lining up. Things will probably be easiest for the entities that have a lot of money.
Like the NRA.
I'm saying that you haven't made clear if you have a principled stance against social engineering in general. If you do, that would entail a commitment to changing the current educational system and policy to be "neutral" on some set of things (good luck with that). If you don't have such a principled stance such that you seek to change how things are currently structured, then I you're playing by a double standard.
And in any case, education is largely about social engineering. As I alluded to, trying to remove it seems to be a performative contradiction.
Again, like the NRA.
This thread also ignores the natural inclination of children to see things innocently. The way they explore and adopt ideas about the world is a personal experience, not some social construction. You can observe babies discovering their bodies and forming their own concepts about the differences between themselves and others by the age of two.
The point here is that if the left really wants to achieve the "honorable" goal of gender-neutrality, then that would really entail forcing hormone treatment on pregnant mothers so that the fetus adopts a more sex-neutral state (so those sexual differences aren't noticible) and then removing all children from their parents after birth and raising them all by the state. It seems to me that it would also have to abolish private Christian/Jewish/Islamic schools as those reinforce the binary sex/gender concept.
Parents should have options on where to send their kids to school and the ideas that their children are exposed to. This is why magnet and charter schools are good alternatives to the public school system which is essentially failing our children anyway. This is how you create diversity, not by applying gender-neutrality which actually stifles diversity and tries to make everyone the same.
I you had read the link in the op, you would have come across this:
That is a clear description of the effect of parental upbringing being undone, and the parents' negative response to it.
So you are wrong, it is not being overlooked.
Quoting Harry Hindu
And this is a completely ridiculous and insulting claim arising from your now obviously deliberate conflation of gender as social construct and sex as biology. It is very very clear that gender neutrality in education has nothing to do with the suppression of sex differences, nor is there any suggestion in any country being discussed here that all children be raised by the state.
And here you have a great example of how the left is just as guilty of placing labels on people and putting them in arbitrary boxes that fit their assumptions, as the right.
What you and the teacher are doing is confusing the wide variety of human behavior that isn't governed by sexual characteristics and labeling them as "gender".
Whimpering and being passive isn't an indication of being "girlie" (whatever that means in this sense). It is an indicator of having low self-esteem or self-worth which a male could exhibit as well. The teacher taught the girl self-worth, not how not to be "girlie", or more "boyish", as those are the very stereotypes that you want to eliminate.
Quoting unenlightened
Really, then what is this?:
It seems to me that the left is okay with a parent having the choice whether to terminate the child's life or not while the child is still physically dependent upon the mother, but once it is out if the womb, the child is ours (the state's). Does your link provide any information that the parents mistreated their child or treated their daughter differently than they would a boy? It seems all speculation on the teacher's part - that they raised their child as a "girl" rather raising her as they would have raised any other child - one with a lack of self-worth.
I have a daughter and two boys and I've taught them both to have a good sense of self-worth. It has nothing to do with feeling like, or being labeled, a boy or girl.
After my daughter read this, she was offended that a teacher would equate her "girlness" with whimpering and letting others walk all over you. Being a girl has nothing to do with that. It has to do with how one values themselves, not anything to do with "gender" - whatever that means.
Quoting unenlightened
Sure, but you're ignoring my wife's own personal experience. If anything it shows that we don't know the influence a teacher has over a child as opposed to their own parents. You seem to think that a teacher's influence will always be greater than a parent's. This simply isn't the case.
I think this is understated. It does not merely excuse, but actually approves. This is not to say, by the way, that it is necessarily the case that boys are not on average, by hormonal influence or some such, more rowdy, aggressive, naughty, etc. But it is a fact also, that society tends to excuse/allow/approve, behaviours differentially between boys and girls. Inevitably, the effect of such differential treatment is to exaggerate differences between the sexes.
And this is also done in obviously arbitrary ways as well, such as dress codes, trousers v skirts, blue v pink, short hair v long hair.
Woman-boobs tend to be bigger than man-boobs, and this is a matter of biology. And a reasonable case can be made that natural selection ensures that men find bigger boobs attractive because *genes, childrearing bla*. And then sexual selection ensures that the difference becomes exaggerated, because that's what sexual selection tends to do - hence peacock tails and like useless appendages.
In short, sexism is 'natural'. Genes will be genes.
So it is unsurprising that folks like and seek to promote sexual stereotypes. And it is unsurprising that in the end, their arguments reduce to, 'well it's natural'. It is natural; what is unnatural is equality and freedom.
That's interesting, because it is exactly the feeling I have about the complaints about the APA guidelines; that if a closer look had been taken, it would have been a non-issue. Perhaps not in every case, but in general, it seems as though a few words - 'gender', 'identity', 'social', have become imbued with a blinding emotional potency, that prevents that close look.
Altruism is a natural behavior of social animals. It is part of what defines them as social.
You also might want to educate yourself on game theory.
Freedom AND equality? Are you so sure that they can coexist?
This is interesting. Along with this.
I didn't look into the objections to the APA guidelines because your spokesman, Baden, had advised that the Swedish preschools reveal what's wrong with the USA. Attendance at those schools is voluntary and paid for by parents (although there are subsidies).
I've been thinking a lot lately about how provocation produces backlash. Do you feel like you might have approached this topic with the intention of being provocative? Is being provocative more important than understanding how others see things? If so, why?
So, seeing as you didn't tag me, I can plausibly deny seeing this and correcting the record. Carry on. :up:
I don't think so. One of the things I have tried to stay away from, but others have wanted to go into is the rather uncommon cases of individuals who actually want to change sex. So I provided links to principles of education, and principles of psychology, and nothing about principles of hormone treatment or surgery. I warned that the topic was somewhat emotive and gave a fair bit of reading in an attempt to slow things down. Short of not mentioning the war at all, I don't think there is much more I could have done.
It seemed to me that this site is well equipped to tackle such issues, having intelligent people from both sides of the political spectrum and both sides of the Atlantic.
By and large the scholars objected to the political tone of the APA guidelines. One scholar, Pamela Paresky, commented that following the APA's approach would result in a breakdown in trust between psychologist and client, and that some of the guidelines actually conflict with the APA's code of professional conduct.
How would you address those concerns?
I'm not clear on what war you're talking about. Could you specify?
You're not really to blame for this either. The sex/gender binary more or less considers taking a gender neutral position amounts to changing the sex of the person involved.
Our gender/sex roles are formed with sorting people of particular bodies in specific positions through the concept of sex. The moment we conceive of gender neutrality, that someone of any body (and sex) maybe of a given social role, we destroy this sorting of bodies.
In terms of the gender/sex roles, gender neutrality destroys both men and women, turns women into men and men into women. It puts "male" bodies into roles that are supposedly only "female". It puts "female" bodies into roles which are only "male." The restriction of these sex/gender roles only needs a body to defy one of stipulations for it to be provocative.