Disambiguating the concept of gender
(I'm new here and this is my first new discussion, so I'm not sure if I've put this in the right category. Mods please feel free to move if necessary / others let me know if I did it wrong.)
So a little background first, I'm some kind of genderqueer/genderfluid/pangender/something, and in trying to put a name to whatever I am over the years, I have long run into conceptual problems with the way the concept of gender is used and overloaded (in the technical sense of applying more than one meaning to a term) in the general discourse, both in trans-inclusive and trans-exclusive communities.
Most of the trans-exclusive communities, your usual cisheteronormative generally right-wing folks, just straight up equate sex with gender, and I don't think I really need to argue much against that view here, I hope, since it's just factually wrong. Gender is defined as something different from sex; if you just want to talk just about sex, we have the word "sex" for that (and even "sex" is a complex thing in need of disambiguation: do you mean chromosomes, hormones, primary sex characteristics, secondary, ...? because those don't all always line up and none of them are strictly binary), and the word "gender" means something else. But what else exactly does it mean?
In trans-exclusive radical feminist communities, and in some parts of academia and elsewhere, they tend to use the word "gender" in the original sense with which it was defined apart from sex, by John Money in 1950, as a social construct. In that sense, gender is something like money (no pun intended). There is nothing intrinsic to gold coins or seashells or any other token of currency that makes it "really" money, something that could be found via an empirical investigation of the currency itself. Something is only money to someone, and in saying that it is money to them, we're really saying something about them, not about the currency: we're saying they accept it in trade. If people have an argument over whether something "really is" money, they're really just expressing their differing policies on accepting it in trade: if Tumamate the Chumash tells Cortez the Spaniard that the shells for which the Chumash tribe are named "are money", and Cortez "disagrees", Tumamate is just signalling the fact that his people accept them in trade, Cortez is just signalling the fact that he does not accept them in trade.
Likewise with things like rank and title, or membership in a social clique: people may argue over whether someone is "really" a geek or is "just" a nerd, or dork, or whatever, but there are no objective empirical criteria for inclusion in those social categories, and saying someone's "not a real geek" is merely signalling non-acceptance of them in that category, not actually stating any (even purported) fact about the world. "Gender" in this sense is like that: genders like "man" and "woman", distinguished from sexes like "male" and "female", are social categories into which people can be recognized, but there is no objective reality imparted by that recognition, someone's gender just consists entirely in their being accepted as that gender. "Gender identity", in this sense of the word gender, means the social category that a person thinks of themselves in terms as, and wants others to think of them as, and disagreement about whether someone who identifies as a man or a woman "really is" one is like disagreement about whether someone who identifies as a nerd or a geek "really is" one: there is no reality to it, you're just saying you reject their self-image and don't see them that way. So people aiming to be gendered a particular way, in this sense, have to perform the role and do the presentation well enough to get other people to accept them into the category they want to be seen as, in order to "really be" that gender, because the acceptance is the entirety of the reality of it.
But in a lot of trans-inclusive communities, "gender" has come to mean something else, though it seems almost nobody distinguishes this other sense from the above sense, and arguments between e.g. transwomen and TERFs seem to stem largely from conflation of these two different senses. This newer sense is "gender" as meaning a psychological property of how you feel about the sex of your body, e.g. if you would not feel comfortable with a male body and would feel comfortable with a female body then your "gender" is "woman", if vice versa it's "man". I think that this is a very important property to keep track of, and that it needs to be separated from the above sociological property. It's important to me personally because I really don't give a damn about the sociological property above, I don't care what pronouns people call me by, I wear whatever I like without regard to how it gets me gendered by other people, but I have definite feelings about what I would like my body to be like. But perhaps for a clearer illustration than weird little old me: there are women who wear "men's" clothes and do "manly" things but have clearly feminine physiques and are recognized as woman because of them, basically tomboys. It's easy to imagine a person (and I've met some such people) born with a male body who wants to be that: still dress like a man and do manly thing, but to have a clearly female body.
I've been proposing for a while now that that last property should get a new name different from "gender", and I propose "bearing". Part of that is because gender dysphoria and euphoria are all about this property, the psychological feeling of (dis)comfort in a particular kind of body, and the root "-phor" means "to bear". (And similarly, rather than "transgender", "cisgender", etc, as values for this property, we could use "transphoric", "cisphoric", etc: "bearing across", "bearing to the same side", etc.) Also because "bearing" makes a nice navigational metaphor with "orientation": if you imagine an abstract space of sex characteristics, and a person moving about in that space, their orientation is where in that space they're facing (the type of sex they're looking at), while their bearing is where in that space they're heading (the type of sex they're aiming to be). But also, perhaps as a transitional compromise, we could just disambiguate the word "gender" between all three of these things with qualifiers: "psychological gender" for bearing, "sociological gender" for the original sense of the word, and if we really have to, "physical gender" for sex. The important part, though, is just that we keep these three different things separate: enough people already are getting out the message that the physical and sociological are separate, but I think it would do a lot of good for everyone if we could also keep the sociological and psychological separate.
(I hope I don't need to add this caveat that of course all three may have strong influences on each other, but that's besides the point that they come apart and are not one and the same thing).
So a little background first, I'm some kind of genderqueer/genderfluid/pangender/something, and in trying to put a name to whatever I am over the years, I have long run into conceptual problems with the way the concept of gender is used and overloaded (in the technical sense of applying more than one meaning to a term) in the general discourse, both in trans-inclusive and trans-exclusive communities.
Most of the trans-exclusive communities, your usual cisheteronormative generally right-wing folks, just straight up equate sex with gender, and I don't think I really need to argue much against that view here, I hope, since it's just factually wrong. Gender is defined as something different from sex; if you just want to talk just about sex, we have the word "sex" for that (and even "sex" is a complex thing in need of disambiguation: do you mean chromosomes, hormones, primary sex characteristics, secondary, ...? because those don't all always line up and none of them are strictly binary), and the word "gender" means something else. But what else exactly does it mean?
In trans-exclusive radical feminist communities, and in some parts of academia and elsewhere, they tend to use the word "gender" in the original sense with which it was defined apart from sex, by John Money in 1950, as a social construct. In that sense, gender is something like money (no pun intended). There is nothing intrinsic to gold coins or seashells or any other token of currency that makes it "really" money, something that could be found via an empirical investigation of the currency itself. Something is only money to someone, and in saying that it is money to them, we're really saying something about them, not about the currency: we're saying they accept it in trade. If people have an argument over whether something "really is" money, they're really just expressing their differing policies on accepting it in trade: if Tumamate the Chumash tells Cortez the Spaniard that the shells for which the Chumash tribe are named "are money", and Cortez "disagrees", Tumamate is just signalling the fact that his people accept them in trade, Cortez is just signalling the fact that he does not accept them in trade.
Likewise with things like rank and title, or membership in a social clique: people may argue over whether someone is "really" a geek or is "just" a nerd, or dork, or whatever, but there are no objective empirical criteria for inclusion in those social categories, and saying someone's "not a real geek" is merely signalling non-acceptance of them in that category, not actually stating any (even purported) fact about the world. "Gender" in this sense is like that: genders like "man" and "woman", distinguished from sexes like "male" and "female", are social categories into which people can be recognized, but there is no objective reality imparted by that recognition, someone's gender just consists entirely in their being accepted as that gender. "Gender identity", in this sense of the word gender, means the social category that a person thinks of themselves in terms as, and wants others to think of them as, and disagreement about whether someone who identifies as a man or a woman "really is" one is like disagreement about whether someone who identifies as a nerd or a geek "really is" one: there is no reality to it, you're just saying you reject their self-image and don't see them that way. So people aiming to be gendered a particular way, in this sense, have to perform the role and do the presentation well enough to get other people to accept them into the category they want to be seen as, in order to "really be" that gender, because the acceptance is the entirety of the reality of it.
But in a lot of trans-inclusive communities, "gender" has come to mean something else, though it seems almost nobody distinguishes this other sense from the above sense, and arguments between e.g. transwomen and TERFs seem to stem largely from conflation of these two different senses. This newer sense is "gender" as meaning a psychological property of how you feel about the sex of your body, e.g. if you would not feel comfortable with a male body and would feel comfortable with a female body then your "gender" is "woman", if vice versa it's "man". I think that this is a very important property to keep track of, and that it needs to be separated from the above sociological property. It's important to me personally because I really don't give a damn about the sociological property above, I don't care what pronouns people call me by, I wear whatever I like without regard to how it gets me gendered by other people, but I have definite feelings about what I would like my body to be like. But perhaps for a clearer illustration than weird little old me: there are women who wear "men's" clothes and do "manly" things but have clearly feminine physiques and are recognized as woman because of them, basically tomboys. It's easy to imagine a person (and I've met some such people) born with a male body who wants to be that: still dress like a man and do manly thing, but to have a clearly female body.
I've been proposing for a while now that that last property should get a new name different from "gender", and I propose "bearing". Part of that is because gender dysphoria and euphoria are all about this property, the psychological feeling of (dis)comfort in a particular kind of body, and the root "-phor" means "to bear". (And similarly, rather than "transgender", "cisgender", etc, as values for this property, we could use "transphoric", "cisphoric", etc: "bearing across", "bearing to the same side", etc.) Also because "bearing" makes a nice navigational metaphor with "orientation": if you imagine an abstract space of sex characteristics, and a person moving about in that space, their orientation is where in that space they're facing (the type of sex they're looking at), while their bearing is where in that space they're heading (the type of sex they're aiming to be). But also, perhaps as a transitional compromise, we could just disambiguate the word "gender" between all three of these things with qualifiers: "psychological gender" for bearing, "sociological gender" for the original sense of the word, and if we really have to, "physical gender" for sex. The important part, though, is just that we keep these three different things separate: enough people already are getting out the message that the physical and sociological are separate, but I think it would do a lot of good for everyone if we could also keep the sociological and psychological separate.
(I hope I don't need to add this caveat that of course all three may have strong influences on each other, but that's besides the point that they come apart and are not one and the same thing).
Comments (1359)
We’re not discussing what is allowed. We’re discussing what ought be allowed.
One country might allow transgender men to use the men’s bathroom and one country might not. So referring to any individual country’s laws is a red herring.
Some think that bathrooms ought be divided by biological sex, some think by gender identity, and some think they shouldn’t be divided at all.
Your argument appears to be:
P1. The English noun “man” only means “biological man” and the English noun “woman” only means “biological woman”
C1. Therefore bathrooms ought be divided by biological sex
This conclusion is a non sequitur and P1 is false.
That is exactly what I’m doing.
That is exactly my argument and you have not convinced me why it should be different.
I’m not saying anything about what words should mean.
I’m saying that:
1) the English noun “man” doesn’t just mean “biologically male”, and
2) transgender men ought be allowed to use men’s bathrooms
Do you understand that these are two completely independent claims and that (1) is simply a descriptive fact about how English speakers speak?
I’m saying that
1) English noun “man” does mean biologically male in the dictionary I use.
2) women should be allowed to use women’s bathrooms. I agree
It doesn't only mean that, hence the phrase "transgender man" being a meaningful phrase in the English language. And sometimes "man" means "human".
Words don't always have just one meaning.
Transgender man is a transgender man. Not a man.
A human is a human. He or she can be a man or woman. The two words came from different sources.
I’m not sure what you are trying to prove.
The word "man" in the phrase "transgender man" does not mean "biologically male".
Quoting Malcolm Parry
Yes, and the word "man" can mean "human". If you type "define: man" into Google then the second definition is "a human being of either sex; a person" and offers the saying "goodwill to all men" which isn't meant to exclude women.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
That the word "man" doesn't just mean "biologically male". I've been very clear on this.
But a man is a biological male.
So not all lions are large tawny-coloured cats that live in prides, found in Africa and north-western India. A stuffed toy lion is toy made from fabric that is filled with a soft material, like cotton or synthetic fibres and not a large tawny cat.
I’m still not sure what you are trying to prove. It’s fun though.
Yes, I remember it well. Have you read Faulkners' Light in August? In a deeply racist country, as in a deeply sexist society such identifications are fraught, and passing is difficult and exposure devastating. But what is your point?
It is a curiosity of a society coming out of a state of open oppression that the status of the oppressed starts to become attractive.
Quoting Bob Dylan
I remember too when one was asked whether or on one would 'let your daughter marry one?' for real. A joke against sexism and racism is kinda smart lyrics eh?
Not everyone uses the word “man” to only refer to a biological male, and the meaning of a word is determined by how language users use words. See Wittgenstein.
And unlike a language like French, there’s no “official” English vocabulary. Even dictionaries are just an attempt to best describe how people use words; they don’t prescribe.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
That the word “man” doesn’t just mean “a biological male”. How many times do I need to repeat this?
Many English words have more than one meaning. The word “man” is such a word. I can’t be any clearer. It’s a very simple thing.
“One giant leap for biological male kind.”
It does. How many times do I have to repeat this.
Mankind is not a man. Transgender man is not a man. Human is not a man. A man is a biological male.
I'm still not sure what you are trying too prove.
You just desperate for men to infiltrate women's spaces?
The phrase “goodwill to all men” from the Bible does not mean “goodwill to all biological males”. It means “goodwill to all people”.
Some words mean more than one thing. The word “bat” can refer to a flying mammal or it can refer to a type of club used in baseball or cricket. The word “man” can refer to a biological male or it can refer to any human.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
That the English word “man” has more than one meaning.
The fact that I have to keep repeating this clearly shows that you have reading or comprehension problems. I can’t help you any further.
My understanding of what you are doing is expressing a cultural value that was formerly implicit due to the absence of a trans discourse, but you would like to be explicitly accepted in opposition to this new discourse. It seems then that you and your interlocutors have different values that you would like to be discursively dominant. As it stands, the idea of gender being separate to biological sex is dominant in most developed countries. Everyone has a right to openly argue for their discursive preferences, but that dominance can be demonstrated as an institutional fact. E.g. Webster's and the Oxford dictionary recognize gender as having a legitimate meaning that can oppose biological sex.
All I am saying here is that a focus on arguing for your values would seem more productive than denying an institutional social reality. Social discourses can change but for now, it is what it is.
You still don't get it. What is your point? Just because mankind or human refers to all humans does not mean a woman is "a man".
Quoting Michael
I'm fine I understand the subtleties of language well. I know when some people are shoehorning nonsense into a conversation to defend their feeble stance.
We agree on everything other than that some men can be women and vice versa.
That words can mean more than one thing and that the English word “man” doesn’t just mean “a biological male”.
I have no issue with anyone one claiming to be whatever gender they like. It is meaningless in the modern world until it comes up against biological reality. When that happens, then biology matters. Sport and women's exclusive places are for women only.
I'm not sure what trans discourse there is that trumps biological reality.
It is a very simple issue people appear to wish to make complicated. I have no idea why.
It is also a fascinating subject. The most fascinating bit is the reactions to the subject.
Well, for example, I typed "Is a transgender man a man?" into Google and got the result:
"Yes, a transgender man is considered a man. The term "transgender man" refers to an individual who was assigned female at birth but identifies as a man. Their gender identity is male, and they live as a man."
The reason I got this result is that the dominant current discourse of developed nations (social reality) does indeed go against biological reality. That doesn't preclude you arguing that it shouldn't be the case though.
Words can mean more than one thing but what man is female?
A simple list would be sufficient.
Yes, words can mean more than one thing. So when you ask "what man is female?" what do you mean by the words "man" and "female"? Do you mean "what biological man is biologically female"? Because the answer to that question is "none", and everyone will agree.
But when someone else says "transgender men are men" they are not saying "transgender men are biologically male" because they mean something else by the word "men".
Your apparent inability to understand this is precisely why you are getting nowhere.
She isn't considered a man in UK law. The person is a female trangender man" not a man. They weren't assigned at birth, they are female. No one assigned the sex. It just is.
Quoting Baden
What does this even mean in 2025? What does living like a man entail?
Quoting Baden
It is utter nonsense and UK law agrees.
Search engines and dictionaries are usually pretty good indicators of social reality though. Law is another important institution and perhaps @Michael being from the UK is a better person to engage you on that specific point.
I addressed that issue earlier, maybe to someone else.
The specific court case was regarding the Equality Act 2010, and in particular this section:
The court ruled that for the purposes of this section of this Act, the words "sex", "man", and "woman" are referring to biology, not gender. The reasoning being that there's a separate section addressing gender, and so it would be redundant for this section to also be referring to gender.
Some people, like Malcolm Parry, clearly misunderstood both what laws are and how courts work. As if this ruling has any bearing on anything else.
Thank you for clarifying.
So, if I go with this definition of men and women.
How does a biological male live like a woman in 2025?
What characteristics mark a male living as a woman?
How does a biological female live like a man in 2025?
What characteristics mark a female living as a man?
Apart from pronouns, infiltrating women's sport and toilets, what is now deemed as living as a woman/man?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_role
I didn't. I couldn't care less about anyone's identity apart from when it bumps up against women's rights to fair sport and exclusive places.
The only issue I have is why people insist men have a right to access women's exclusive places. What people think and how they act, I care not.
Wiki again.
What does it practically mean? People can wear what they like, have sex with who they like, have any job they like, enjoy any pastime they like.
What does living like a woman mean? I know many woman who would be affronted if they were deemed men because they eschewed gender roles.
The argument is that some of these spaces shouldn't be exclusively for those who are biologically female or for those who are biologically female; that they should be exclusively for those whose gender identity is female or for those whose gender identity is male.
So what good reasons are there for saying that Bathroom A should only be for biological males and that Bathroom B should only be for biological females?
The same reason that you yourself happily exclude cisgender males. All those reasons.
It's the law in the UK, isn't it?
No. There's a nightclub that I sometimes go to where all the toilets are unisex. There's no law that dictates who can use which bathrooms.
Which are?
The BBC and the Guardian say biology dictates use of gender designated bathrooms in the UK.
US hospitals also have unisex toilets.
That just seems to be some minister's interpretation of the ruling. As far as I'm aware there's no law on bathroom usage at all.
The ruling is just that it is not illegal for a transgender man to be excluded from a space that is marketed as being for biological men. That's not the same as saying either a) that it is illegal for a transgender man to use a space marketed as being for biological men or b) that men's bathrooms are only for biological men.
You tell me. You are excluding them.
I don't think there ever was.
I'm not excluding anyone. I've said many times before that I think bathrooms should be unisex. You're the one who is saying that bathroom usage should be divided by biology. Why is that? If bathrooms are to be divided at all, why not instead by gender?
Personally, I think it's bizarre to argue that there should be separate men's and women's toilets and that any transgender man who has medically transitioned and had both top and bottom surgery should continue to use the women's toilets.
1. UK law does not guarantee access to bathrooms based on gender.
2. Trans people can be excluded from use of bathrooms that align with their gender (in the UK)
3. UK law is contrary to your values.
Correct?
Is your quote
Quoting Michael
see above.
It's not quite clear. The closest thing in the ruling is:
Whether or not this includes bathrooms isn't obvious, given that cubicles are private and biology doesn't seem at all relevant when washing your hands in a public sink.
That was premised on the fact that we do have separate men's and women's bathrooms.
So, my position is:
1) bathrooms ought be unisex
2) but, if we have separate men's and women's bathrooms then they should be separated by gender, not sex
We do and you excluded cisgender men. On what basis?
I guess I don't understand how transgender people could be restricted wrt restaurants, shops, hospitals, or shelters, but that this wouldn't apply to bathrooms. If you go to a gym, aren't the toilets in the changing rooms?
Quoting wikipedia
But if you look at that article, this originally came up because women were guaranteed places on "public boards" (which sounds like what Americans call local councils?) The UK ruling says this does not apply to transgender women. So it would be unreasonable for you to say that the UK, in general, focuses on gender to the exclusion of biology. It does not.
On the basis that we have separate men’s and women’s bathrooms. If cis and trans men are allowed to use the women’s bathrooms and cis and trans women are allowed to use the women’s bathrooms then we don’t actually have separate men’s and women’s bathrooms. We have unisex bathrooms.
But why would you exclude them? What reasons would you give?
You're not making any sense.
I don't think anyone should be excluded from any bathrooms. I think bathrooms should be unisex.
But, if we do have bathrooms that we name "men's bathrooms" and bathrooms that we name "women's bathrooms", and if only certain types of people are allowed to use the bathrooms named "men's bathrooms" and only certain types of people are allowed to use the bathrooms named "women's bathrooms", it makes more sense for the division to be based on gender rather than sex.
So you would immediately take the male and female signs down and anyone can use them?
Yes, much like a nightclub I used to frequent.
Changing rooms?
I didn’t say that.
I said that I don’t know of any UK law that dictates which bathrooms people can use.
The recent UK Supreme Court ruling is only that the words “sex”, “man”, and “woman” as used in section 11 of the Equality Act 2010 are referring to biological sex, biological men, and biological women. The implications of that ruling are not entirely clear, and the interim guidance issued by the EHRC that you referenced is just that - interim guidance - and not statute.
If there's full frontal public nudity then I don't think it matters whether your genitals are natural or artificial, and so a trans man with a penis should use the men's changing room and a trans woman with breasts and a vagina should use the women's changing room.
Right. I get the feeling you don't really want to face the consequences of this ruling.
So you would exclude most trans women from changing rooms where there is nudity?
It's a start, I suppose.
And you would include some trans women (i.e. those who have had bottom surgery) and exclude some trans men (i.e. those who have had bottom surgery) from women's changing rooms where this is nudity?
And you don't see the problem with the first thing you said and the bullet points you showed? If bathrooms are unisex then "cis-people" can use any bathrooms they want as well as any gender which would place trans-people in the same spaces with the same people that you claim they would be in danger.
Besides, the evidence does not show that trans-people are more at risk from using the bathroom they prefer. You even said the statistics doesn't show that trans-people were attacked more in bathrooms than in other places, so how can you say that they are more in danger in using a particular bathroom, especially when men can use the women's bathroom if they are unisex?
Quoting Michael
The way a trans-person feels is not a man or a woman. What does it feel like to be a man or a woman? We all have feelings. Which ones are the woman and man feelings? It appears you are conflating certain feelings that have nothing to do with sex with sex, which would be sexist.
Quoting Michael
Then what are they actually saying?
But wait, I thought trans-people aren't talking about their biology. :roll: contradiction after contradiction after contradiction. It's contradictions all the way down.
Most of the abuse they receive is “Get out! You’re not allowed to use this bathroom you pervert!” (even though they’re not perverts and are allowed to use that bathroom), so unisex bathrooms would solve the problem entirely.
Quoting Harry Hindu
That their gender is male.
Quoting Harry Hindu
These are four different things:
1. Male sex
2. Male gender
3. Female sex
4. Female gender
Most people who have (1) also have (2), and is the reason that it’s called the “male” gender, and most people who have (3) also have (4), and is the reason that it’s called the “female” gender.
But some people have (1) and (4) and some people have (2) and (3).
What contradiction?
Is a trans man with a penis biologically male or biologically female?
So you think a penis or lack of penis is important criteria in changing rooms? Is that correct?
I would prefer women to decide and if they were all happy to include everyone, so be it. But they aren’t and I’m aligned with women who want women’s spaces exclusively for women.
How is a cisgender woman to know if the person naked next to them is a trans man with an artificial penis and not a cisgender man with a natural penis?
How is a cisgender woman to know if the person naked next to them is a cisgender woman with a natural vagina and not a transgender woman with an artificial vagina?
What about women's rights? Nobody even wants to mention the issue that brought on the recent UK ruling. Aren't women's rights enough of a concern to even talk about it?
It's fairly obvious in most cases.
Even if that were true, it’s not always obvious.
Do you think it’s acceptable for a trans man with a penis, and who is indistinguishable from the typical cisgender man, to get naked in the women’s changing rooms?
Do you think it’s acceptable for a trans woman with a vagina, and who is indistinguishable from the typical cisgender woman, to get naked in the men’s changing rooms?
The reasonable answer to both questions is “no”. The trans man with a penis should use the men’s changing rooms and the trans woman with a vagina should use the women’s changing rooms.
Everyone mentions that. In fact, “women’s rights” is usually the very thing that is used to argue against “trans rights”.
Quoting frank
Everyone’s rights matter. Men’s, women’s, cis, trans, black, white, straight, gay.
But when it comes to something like bathrooms, it’s hard to see how person A using a bathroom affects person B’s rights. One person using a private cubicle to take a piss has no impact on anyone else.
I think it's just old fashioned misogyny.
I honestly don't get it.
The ruling was about seats on public boards. Should seats that were guaranteed to women be given to trans women? The women in Scotland said no. Why do you think they felt that way?
Yet I've seen women go to the mens bathroom because the line to the women's bathroom was to long and men go into the womans bathroom to assist their elderly mother and no one said a thing.
Women are uncomfortable with men in their bathroom and the threat they face is rape compared to someone calling them a name? Seriously?
And I think you would receive some pushback from trans on unisex bathrooms because they see using a man or woman's bathroom as a means of affirming their gender.
Quoting Michael
Male is a sex. Quoting Michael
This doesn't answer my question, and so far you've only provided circular answers. When you say you are a male or female, what are you referring to? What properties make one a male or female? How do we know we aren't talking past each other when using these terms?
And why would you be co-opting terms originally used to refer to sex if gender and sex and seperate? Why wouldn't gender be related to the type of job you have, or your religion? Why sex, if they are distinct?
That's not how the law works.
I'll quote from the ruling:
1. The Scottish Parliament passed the 2018 Act to provide for positive action measures to be taken in relation to the appointment of women to non-executive posts on boards of certain Scottish public authorities. The 2018 Act sets out a gender representation objective for a public board which is that “it has 50% of non-executive members who are women”.
2. The act the provides a definition of "woman" that includes "a person who has the protected characteristic of gender reassignment (within the meaning of section 7 of the Equality Act 2010)".
3. It was challenged and affirmed that "the definition of 'woman' in section 2 of the 2018 Act was outside the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament".
Which is just to say that the Scottish Parliament does not have the authority to define the legal term "woman". Only the UK Parliament has the authority to define the legal term "woman", and the meaning of this term is established by section 11 of the Equality Act 2010, and refers only to biological women.
Quoting frank
I don't know, I'm not a mind reader.
That's a despicable thing to say.
And a gender. Words can have more than one meaning.
Quoting Harry Hindu
I've already addressed this. Trans-inclusive bathroom policies do not put cisgender women at a greater risk of rape. Trans women are not just perverts and rapists pretending to be women so that they can more easily sexually assault biological women.
Quoting Harry Hindu
It's not co-opting terms. Transgender (and third gender) people have existed and have been talked about for thousands of years.
I'm talking about the actual perverts, whether they be trans or not, entering women's bathrooms.
Quoting Michael
You're still avoiding the question as to what anyone means when using these terms. Just because something has been done for thousands of years doesn't mean it has any basis in reality.
Part of what constitutes values are balances of rights and these are intertwined with socially determined definitions. I know cis-women, for example, who would virulently object to excluding trans women from womanhood and consider it a (trans)woman's right to use the woman's bathroom as much as a woman's. And even if we accept your premise and speak of biological women's rights in opposition to trans-women's rights, we still identify a conflict of rights in the overall sphere of human rights between some* biological women who object to certain things---e.g. trans women using their bathrooms---and trans women. So, I think we are indirectly speaking about rights just by discussing who is affected in what way and so on.
*This is important. In Ireland, as in Thailand, people are free to use bathrooms in accordance with their gender identity. And women in those countries don't generally consider that an impingement of their rights. We are back to culture. This is a very contentious issue in the U.S. and in perhaps some other countries, but it can only become a rights issue in a cultural context where biological women decide trans women impinge on their rights by doing certain things or being in certain places they consider exclusive to them.
Personally, like most Irish and Thai people, I see no problem with bathrooms being used according to gender identity and there is no significant problem that I am aware of socially that is specific to biological women's attitudes either, so in those cultural contexts, the issue just doesn't really arise. When it comes to sports and gender-affirming care though, that needs a lot of careful working out based on scientific evidence etc. I don't think there are simple answers and I don't have a position because I haven't researched it enough.
So trans women ought not be allowed to use women's bathrooms because perverts exist? That's terrible reasoning.
And, again, the studies show that trans-inclusive bathroom policies do not put cisgender women at a greater risk of sexual assault and rape. Someone who's willing to rape someone is also willing to walk into a bathroom that they're not supposed to.
Quoting Harry Hindu
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_identity
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_role
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_psychology
Start on line 1, finish on whatever line is last.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Essentialism is a dead-end philosophy. Whether we're discussing biology or psychology, there is no unambiguous set of necessary and sufficient conditions. You might as well ask "what is a game?"
If you don't understand gender then fine. You don't need to. You just need to accept that trained psychologists and sociologists understand that they exist, understand what they are, and understand that transgender people ought be respected for who they are – not as merely biological machines but as conscious individuals with all the mental faculties and fuzzy categories that this entails.
That's precisely the problem, and is what I brought up on page 8:
So let's not use the words "man", "woman", "male", or "female" at all, and ask a single question:
Should bathrooms be divided by biological sex, by something else, or by nothing at all?
The recent UK ruling didn't start with concern over bathrooms. That's just the issue that took over this thread. It was about public boards, which administer government services. Those boards were supposed to guarantee seats for women at 50%. A group of Scottish women objected to transwomen taking seats reserved for women.
I imagine the seats were supposed to be reserved for women so that a female voice would influence the government's decisions. The Scottish women publicly stated that they believed that filling seats reserved for women with transgender women was a threat to women's rights.
Whether one agrees with these women, or not, when a bunch of women complain that women's rights are endangered, the public ought to pay attention. The UK government did pay close attention and ruled in their favor: that when the seats were guaranteed to women, the point was that they should be reserved for biological women.
It would be very fitting if instead of reducing the issue to bathrooms, we talked about whether the women were right. Was the UK Supreme Court right? Were women's rights endangered by substituting transgender women for biological women?
It doesn't explain what they mean when using the terms man and woman, which is why you cant point to it in the links you provided.
Quoting Michael
Really? Define essentialism then. And what are psychologists and sociologists if words don't have an unambiguous meaning? What are you actually talking ABOUT?
Quoting Michael
You're the one that has now called into question the meaning of words. What are bathrooms, sex, gender, male, female, woman, man, etc? It seems that we would need to define these things to even hope to answer these other questions.
I see where you're coming from. So, it became a rights issue because a group of women objected and yes, the public should pay attention. But I don't think there is an absolute answer as to whether they were right or wrong. The situation is contingent on the objection which is contingent on the cultural context, which is contingent on local cultural values. If this group hadn't objected, and perhaps in another country there might not have been an objection, this issue wouldn't have arisen and wouldn't have needed to. It's culturally conditioned and would seem, in this case, to be very difficult to universalize. That's just my take. I'm not deep into this and I have no objection to attempts to argue for either side. It could be interesting.
Well on behalf of the Scottish women, thanks for at least acknowledging the nature of their complaint. Other participants have made it clear they couldn't care less.
The world in general is following the UK lead on transgender issues. The US is in the process of following the British pullback on transitioning youths. My guess is that something like the Scottish issue will come up in the US eventually. For now, we're as woke as you Irish.
The very first line of the very first link:
"Gender is the range of social, psychological, cultural, and behavioral aspects of being a man (or boy), woman (or girl), or third gender."
So, we have a fuzzy collection of social, psychological, cultural, and behavioral stuff that we group together and label "man" and another fuzzy collection of social, psychological, cultural, and behavioral stuff that we group together and label "woman", and sometimes a third fuzzy collection of social, psychological, cultural, and behavioral stuff that we group together and give a different label.
Included in this fuzzy collection is basically anything where we have a separate "men's X" or "women's X" and where "X" is not a description of genitals or chromosomes or the like.
The group that one "belongs" to is almost determined by one's biology, and in particular one's phenotype, and is the reason why the same word is used to refer both to gender and to sex. This has, unfortunately, caused many to conflate the two.
Quoting Harry Hindu
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essentialism
Quoting Harry Hindu
No, we don't.
I only suggested that we not use the words "man" and "woman" because you are having so much trouble understanding what they mean when discussing gender. Presumably we both have a clear understanding of what "bathroom" and "penis" and "vagina" mean.
Ha, we'll see, I guess. Anyhow, I am going to resume observer status for a while. Good night.
The women were right.
You cut out the salient point of my paragraph:
"Remember the uproar when Rachel Dolezal, a white women, identified herself (or tried to) as black? That didn't sit well with a lot of people. There were accusations of cultural appropriation. To take it to the extreme, imagine Donald Trump identifying as black. Ludicrous, right? Even if lightning were to strike Trump, and he truly believed in his heart that he was black, he's still white. But how is that different than Bruce Jenner identifying as a woman? Why is that tolerated?"
Are these supposed to be related questions? Because the Supreme Court didn't rule on whether or not anyone's rights were endangered. They only ruled that:
In other words, the Scottish parliament passed a law with these two provisions:
1. Women ought make up at least 50% of the board
2. The term "woman" in (1) includes anyone with a female GRC
Section (2) conflicts with the EA 2010 which defines the term "woman" to only include biological women. Given that the EA 2010 as UK law takes precedence over Scots law, section (2) is overruled, and the legal meaning of the term "woman" in Section (1) only includes biological women.
The ruling explicitly says in its second paragraph:
The issues become much clearer and easier to settle in one’s mind when one abandons the concept of gender entirely, or at least relegate it to a grammatical concept, a relic of language, rather than a statement about biology. It ends the cognitive dissonance required to support and think about these ideas clearly.
Did you mean "excludes" there?
Could you explain why you think so?
No. It includes those with a GRC and is why the issue was raised. Scottish Women Ltd argued that that inclusion is contrary to the EA 2010 and that the Scottish parliament does not have the authority to contradict UK law.
So the outcome is that transgender women can't take the place of biological women for the purposes of the 50% women rule. Right?
Specifically, see here:
The Supreme Court ruled that this contradicts UK law, and so the Scottish parliament were required to repeal that definition:
So only biological women can satisfy the 50% rule, right?
Yes.
Do you see this as the most common view in your community?
Autism spectrum?
Huh?
I am, I just don't have the hyper-literal thing. You seem to.
In the West, would you say most people are thinking of biology when they say "woman?"
I agree. I think the trans activists were thinking of a quasi-philosophical view of gender that didn't make it out to the population at large.
The law could have instead been written as:
Which was their intention when they wrote the law.
Unfortunately for them it was written a different way:
Allowing (2) to be overruled by the EA 2010.
There's no such thing as a "man's seat" or a "woman's seat". The law in question simply states:
I do too. It's when the trans activist says biology should be ignored that the community balks.
Quoting tim wood
A transgender man could have taken a man's seat. Post UK Supreme Court ruling, those seats have to be divided by biology.
Sure, when someone uses words in a way that is contradictory people will have a difficult time understanding them.
Quoting Michael
Yet you assert that a trans-woman has a vagina when what they actually have is an open wound that they have to use medical grade stents to keep open. Any misunderstanding I have is a result of your inability to define the terms you are using in a meaningful way.
Quoting Michael
No wonder I couldn't find what I was looking for. I was asking about their feeling of what it means to be a man or woman. You're now talking about cultural norms which are the antithesis of personal feelings. This is exactly what I was trying to avoid in talking past each other. Can a woman still be a woman if they don't adopt the cultural expectations of the culture they are in?
How is this any different than being sexist? Isn't it sexist to claim that women should only dress in high heels and skirts?
Doesn't this mean that when someone travels to a different culture that has different aspects their gender changes?
Doesn't this mean that gender is determined by culture and not a personal feeling?
Quoting MichaelI do, but you were the one asserting that words have an unambiguous meaning, contradicting yourself again.
Call it whatever you like. A random stranger in the same room isn’t going to be able to tell the difference between a natural and an artificial set of genitals.
A trans man who has had bottom surgery ought use the men’s changing room and a trans woman who has had bottom surgery ought use the women’s changing room.
Their chromosomes and the genitals they were born with are irrelevant.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Try reading it again. You’ll see that the word “psychological” was listed.
Quoting Harry Hindu
No I wasn’t. Many words have ambiguous meanings. Many words have multiple meanings. I’m not the one asking for some singular definition of “male gender”, just as I’m not the one claiming that there’s some singular definition of “male sex”. Language and biology and psychology and society and culture are not that simple. The world is a complex place, and is precisely why any essentialist approach to the issue is doomed to fail.
This is one of the reasons liberals have been having a tough time in elections and it's just wrong. Trans men aren't women. They're men pretending to be women.
The UK Supreme Court overturned that Scottish law. Only biological women can fill the 50% quota for seats on the public boards.
Or. they might actually think that. Still, I can think I'm a disabled person but if my legs work absolutely fine and I cut off an actual paraplegic and park at their one reserved handicapped spot, depending on the society, I might soon be needing that spot legitimately.
"Pretending", per se, requires conscious and willfully intended imagination that still cognitively understands the underlying nature of what is real and what is not and chooses to temporarily embrace the latter.
So. As it is, your critique could use a bit of, refinement, shall we say, before it becomes as accurate as it could be.
Edit: Ah, just saw that substativisms thread was merged here. I'll take another look.
required? That's .... not a good position.
Quoting T Clark
This seems patently untrue... Struck me as fully bizarre and almost made-up.
Otherwise, I agree with that comment entirely. Quoting Banno
They don't. So we don't. Quite literally, in a physical sense. That, perhaps, you've not seen or experienced this is no argument.
My concept was never ambiguous. Sex of a person is immutable.
Gender was a word to describe the social and cultural characteristics of the two sexes.
It became ambiguous when people thought there was a magical way to cross this boundary of immutable sex and become a different gender. Now in 2025 when anyone can take on any role they wish (in western liberal democracies at least) then the concept of gender is becoming less and less important. The only issue is when the magical gender morphing men come up against current norms for sex based exclusive places. No one has an issue with women in men’s spaces. There is an issue of mutilation of women’s bodies and flooding them with synthetic hormones but that is for the butchers of the medical profession.
It all seems fairly simple and the ambiguity started with the assumption that men could become women and vice versa.
Muddled, deluded and (sometimes) politically motivated people took a perfectly unambiguous word and made a mess which thankfully is slowly unraveling.
The only reason that it is an issue is because females still have a way to go before the social imbalance of power and safety is levelled. That will not happen in anyone’s lifetime posting on here. Until then they need to have exclusive places.
People can be whoever they are, can present however they like but the red line for me is women having a right to compete in sport and to have spaces without men when they are vulnerable.
I don't think it is different. What is tolerated depends on the culture of the time in relation to the social construct in each case.
Hence, slavery was perfectly acceptable until William Wilberforce wasn’t happy. (I know it wasn’t just him)
Even if that were true, that has nothing to do with how laws work.
They could have written the law in this way:
A1. At least 50% of the board must be X
A2. The term “X” in (1) means “cisgender women or transgender women”
But instead they wrote it this way:
B1. At least 50% of the board must be women
B2. The term “women” in (1) means “cisgender women or transgender women”
The only issue with B is that B2 is incompatible with the EA 2010. Had the law been written as A then the Supreme Court would have ruled differently.
What does that mean?
If “woman” means “biologically female” then to act like a woman is to act biologically female. But what does it mean to act biologically female?
Does it mean to act as if one has an XX karyotype? What does that mean?
Does it mean to act as if one has ovaries and a womb? What does that mean?
The fact that you even use a phrase like “act like a woman” shows at least a partial understanding of gender-as-distinct-from-sex.
So bite me!:smile:
Proper debate on here.
My wife does not have ovaries or a womb, but she does have breasts and a vagina. Should I be worried I am an unwitting homosexual? (She used to have them but transitioned surgically due to cancer.) Should I tell her to use the mens'
Quoting Malcolm Parry
Stupid leading question leading nowhere, deserves a little ridicule.
Gender was a word to describe the social and cultural characteristics of the two sexes.
So a man (Adult Human male) is acting in the manner associated with the social and cultural characteristics of a woman (Adult Human Female).
Leading nowhere with you. I agree.
I'm not trying to catch anyone out. I'm interested in the topic and why people think the way they do and why society is in such a muddle about it. It's fascinating.
One can psychologically identify as belonging to the social and cultural group that is usually occupied by the opposite biological sex.
And words like “man” and “woman” can refer either to a person of a particular biological sex or to a person who belongs to the particular social and cultural group usually occupied by a particular biological sex. Usually these are congruent, but sometimes they’re not.
I agree.
Quoting Michael
I disagree.
Which goes back to what I said on page 8.
Quoting Michael
Which we disagree on.
So why is that?
Prima facie there’s no good reason to treat people with an XX karyotype and people with an XY karyotype differently. Outside of any medical issues, what relevance is DNA to everyday life?
And prime facie there’s no good reason to treat people with ovaries and people with testes differently. Outside of any medical issues or sexual reproduction, what relevance are gonads to everyday life?
And prime facie there’s no good reason to treat people with a penis and people with a vagina differently. Outside of any medical issues or sexual reproduction, what relevance are genitals to everyday life? Perhaps it’s only relevant wherever nudity is a thing?
The question we have to then ask is why are there social and cultural differences between the sexes? Is it because of biological differences, or are biological differences merely incidental? Are there social and cultural differences between the sexes because of psychological differences between the sexes? If so, and if there are people who are biologically female but have a psychology closer to the typical biological male than to the typical biological female then it makes more sense for this individual to be treated like the typical biological male - precisely because in everyday life our psychology is much more important than our DNA, our gonads, and our genitals.
Round here at least, because folks are not all great at reading, toilets are generally labelled with a cartoon of a person either in a dress or in trousers; these items of clothing are not genetically determined. The meaning of the pictures are thus unambiguously gender distinguished, not biologically distinguished.
Sports teams have their own tests - it used to be hormone based, but I don't know, these days.
Incidentally, speaking of changing rooms - what does one do if a man wants to take his young daughter, or a woman her young son, to the swimming bath? This is a genuine problem that arises from the separation, however our current question is resolved. Obviously a babe in arms has to go with the parent; obviously a teen has to go on their own. Where is the line between them? And for children with Downs' or other disability? Would you send your 4 yr old to get changed on their own? (This is a genuine social dilemma I have faced with my daughter)
I would have thought that anywhere that has children being undressed would have private cubicles.
That’s how it was the last time I went swimming (years ago). There weren’t separate men’s and women’s changing rooms, just individual cubicles that anyone could use.
Let me take you by the hand, and lead you to my local pool, I will show you something that will make you change your mind.
Because women cannot compete with men in sports and because many women feel threatened and uncomfortable when men are are around when they are undressing, changing sanitary products etc.
In my local pool they have recently installed more cubicles for changing. The showers are still open. I took my daughter in with me until she was old enough to change on her own. Still remember many times when I'd have to send in a female attendant to tell to stop messing about and get a move on.
It just came naturally. Just like being naked in front of your child stopped after a time. I think my child chose the time. It seemed organic
And I’m sure trans women who have surgically transitioned feel the same.
That is a consequence of a choice they made. I'm not sure what the authorities could do to accommodate them.
Let them use the women’s changing room. They shouldn’t be required to use the men’s changing room.
This is probably the elephant in the room that is rarely talked about, because it's obviously an unfortunate thing to have to tell someone that they are unable to pass for the opposite sex, but it's the reality for many.
The specific case I had in mind were those who have had bottom surgery.
It seems bizarre to say that trans men with an artificial penis ought use the women’s changing room and trans women with artificial breasts and an artificial vagina ought use the men’s changing room.
There's a popular subreddit called r/transpassing. People put their pictures up and ask for advice about how well they're passing, and what they mean by this is that they want strangers to think they're biological women (or biological men.) The notion that gender is a construct is true. That fact doesn't have much to do with what's actually going on.
Why should women have to give up their hard fought for rights to men?
They’re not.
It isn’t unfortunate. It is fact.
There doesn't seem to be a satisfactory solution for it, other than a seperate set of changing rooms, etc.
Quoting frank
Unfortunately for trans people, it is just as much constructed by themselves as it is by society at large, and those views seem to constantly conflict each other.
And that's another reason transitioning should only be for mature adults. A fair number of detransitioned youths say they thought they could actually change to the opposite sex. They learned through experience post-transition, that you can't actually do that.
This is where there is some difficulty. On the one hand, children are likely too young to make such drastic medical decisions, but on the other hand transitioning before puberty is likely easier and has more satisfactory results than transitioning after puberty.
I suppose we have to determine whether or not the rate of regret is sufficiently high to warrant erring on the side of caution.
:up:
A prepubescent child cannot make a decision like this, because they have no frame of reference for what the list of nightmarish potential consequences even means, thus there cannot be informed consent.
On some level I get the dilemma, but as far as I'm concerned there's only one sane answer to it, and it isn't particularly hard to see.
That sane answer eludes quite a few.
That’s true about all children’s medical issues, and is why doctors, parents, and (when relevant) psychiatrists are also involved in the decision making.
As a related example is when the decision is made on how best to treat someone born intersex. Sometime this requires surgery to “make” them a boy or a girl.
That’s usually where it starts. But it’s naive to presuppose that all cases of gender dysphoria and the like can be treated merely by psychotherapy and non-hormonal medication. It’s when this fails that other approaches are necessary.
In that case, as with hermaphrodites, I am sooner inclined to say something is demonstrably wrong that would warrant the making of such a decision on behalf of the child.
However, stories abound of kids who decide on a whim they want to be of the opposite sex, and manage to receive hormone therapies and whatnot without ever seeing a psychologist or even without their parents consent.
Sure, but that’s a reason to better regulate the treatment; it’s not a reason to dismiss the treatment as an option entirely.
We now know that gender dysphoria can be transient. This quote is from Dr David Bell, the psychiatrist who worked with trans kids and eventually was instrumental in reforming the NHS approach youth transition:
here
There are other reasons people detransition. In general, anyone with mental health issues should spend a lot of time in therapy before transitioning. For some, transitioning is basically running away from their problems.
Hermaphrodism and gender dysphoria are rare conditions. These are obviously not the target of the discussion.
Often used to justify everything else.
I agree; it seemed natural and organic. But if you think about it, there is not much natural or organic about it. Such things do not occur in nature, and are not universal in human societies either.
I think Dr Bell is right in almost every particular. I wouldn't call it "transient" though. In my experience women are body shamed by society and by advertising in particular and the prevalence of cosmetic surgery and the weight loss industry suggests it is spreading to men too rather than diminishing. Many remain body shamed all their lives.
Anyone remember this? My mother, worked in a bank, but was forced to leave on getting married - company policy. Blatantly unfair dismissal today, but open standard practice back then.
We are social animals and take millions of unconscious cues every day. No one learns the etiquette of buying rounds at a bar but everyone in UK knows it.
Or just disperse with the notion that women should wear dresses and men should wear pants. If we did that then wearing a dress or pants would not be a form of gender expression. Many women wear pants already and still consider themselves women, so what exactly are trans-people saying when they wear a dress and high heels and claim that is a form of gender expression? Men wear earrings and have long hair and do not consider themselves women.
With this in mind, trans-genderism would actually be a man or woman doing what is expected of the other sex while maintaining that they are still the sex they were born as. A man wearing a dress and still considers himself a man would be a trans-gendered person. A man wearing a dress and believes that now makes him a woman has a delusional disorder.
Quoting Michael
Which is to say that bathrooms should be genderless. I can get behind this as this is a solution that does not affirm one's delusions that one is a man or woman when they are not.
A society where people that do not wear clothes would be genderless as well.
A society where both sexes where earrings and have long hair is one wear wearing earrings and having long hair would not be a means of affirming one's sex/gender.
Quoting Michael
What would one's bottom have to do with where you can change clothes? Whose the one concerned about genitalia now?
What type of bottom one has is relevant in medical and mating contexts. That is when others need to know what type of bottom one has.
Quoting Michael
And invoking the term, "psychological" just reinforces my assertion that we are dealing with a delusional disorder. You are ignoring all the problems I posed by defining gender as a social construct. You continue to be intellectually dishonest. I have responded to each and every point you have made in your posts yet you cannot show the same respect.
I have also been asking which feelings one has that makes one a man or woman. You can't even explain what it means to be a man or woman for yourself. What feelings are you referring to when you assert you are one or the other? How am I suppose to understand what you mean when you won't explain what you mean?
How can one's feelings be gender and a social construct be gender when a trans-person's feelings is at odds with the social construct?
Quoting Michael
For a word to have ambiguous meanings means that it has no meaning, and that you end up talking past each other.
A word has multiple meanings only in different contexts. Each meaning of a word is specific to a certain context and the goal you are attempting to accomplish. You don't apply all meanings of the word in one context, or in different context, as that would be a category mistake.
Your phrasing equivocates. You call the transgender woman a "man", suggesting that by "man" you are referring to biological sex, and so presumably by "woman" you are also referring to biological sex?
But as has been explained many times before, the biological man who identifies as a woman doesn’t identify as having XX chromosomes, ovaries, or a vagina, and so your claim is an obvious misrepresentation.
Given that the transgender woman doesn't identify as a biological woman, what delusion is it you think she has?
Quoting Harry Hindu
You tell me. Why do we have separate men's and women's changing rooms at all? Surely it has something to do with phenotype? If so, then it stands to reason that any biological man with a female phenotype – even if artificial – ought use the women's changing room and any biological woman with a male phenotype – even if artificial – ought use the men's changing room.
There's certainly no good reason for something like karyotype to be at all relevant.
Quoting Harry Hindu
There are sex differences in psychology. These differences are what drive the development of gender expression and gender roles in society – expressions and roles which have absolutely nothing to do with karyotype and almost nothing to do with phenotype.
The psychology of most biological males is similar enough that they identify as belonging to the same gender, and the psychology of most biological females is similar enough that they identify as belonging to the same gender. But psychology is complex and a gradient, not straightforward and black and white. Some are gender non-conforming but still identify as (mostly) "belonging" to one gender or the other, some do not identify as "belonging" to either gender – or as "belonging" to both – and some identify as "belonging" to the gender that is most predominantly occupied by the opposite biological sex.
Quoting Harry Hindu
It's not just about clothes. But, sure, in some idealised society that has no gender roles and where there is never any kind of separation or difference between biological males and biological females (outside of reproduction and reproductive health), and assuming for the sake of argument that sex differences in psychology are explained entirely by nurture and not by nature, then perhaps transgenderism wouldn't occur (although gender dysphoria might) – but we don't live in such a world.
You seem to be suggesting that anything that is socially or culturally "caused" therefore isn't "real"? That would be a non sequitur.
The delusion is that there is more to being a woman than having XX Chromosomes, ovaries and vagina, or that having XX Chromosomes, ovaries and vagina does not make one a woman (but then why would they be attempting to get artificial ones?). This is what I have been trying to get you to show for several pages now and you keep avoiding the question. What more is there to being a woman than having XX Chromosomes, ovaries and vagina that isn't some sexist trope? If it is a feeling, then what is the feeling? What does it feel like for you to be a man or woman? You can't even speak for yourself as to what you mean.
Quoting Michael
Why are we even talking about sex genitalia in a thread about gender? Again, why should it matter what sex parts one has (and to even call artificial sex parts, "sex parts" is questionable) if gender is a feeling and/or social construct?
Quoting Michael
Still talking about differences in sexes....
If these properties exist in both males and females then how can you say that these mental functions and behaviors are distinctions of sex rather than simply being part of the variety that exists among all humans? Also, are these mental functions and behaviors of each sex consistent across all cultures? If so, we would be talking about something biological, not cultural.
I've come to the same conclusion. Being trans does not change a person into the opposite sex. It's just a person behaving as if they're the opposite sex.
So their delusion is in thinking that the English noun "woman" doesn't just mean "an adult human with an XX karyotype, ovaries, and a vagina"?
Well, this isn't a delusion because it's true. The English noun "woman" doesn't just mean this. It has more than one meaning. It can also refer to a non-biological gender.
And even if it were false, thinking that a word means something it doesn't hardly qualifies as a type of psychosis.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Because people like you are claiming that things like bathrooms and changing rooms ought be divided by biological sex. So why? What is the relevant difference between biological men and biological women such that they ought get changed in different rooms? Why don't we all get changed in the same room?
Quoting Harry Hindu
I don't understand what you're asking here.
There are observable psychological differences between the sexes. How much of this is nature and how much is nurture is still an open question, though it's likely that both play a role.
But this isn't some absolute distinction such that every biological male has one type of psychology and every biological female has the other type of psychology. There are people who fall in between, and there are biological males who share the type of psychology typical of biological females and biological females who share the type of psychology typical of biological males.
What behaviors are specific to a sex? Wanting to wear a dress and high heels is specific to a certain culture. The way women are expected to dress can vary across cultures, so would not be something based in biology and sex.
Yet you keep referring to biology. I have already been over this and we are going in circles because you won't address what a non-biological gender is and keep brining up biology while saying that gender is not biological. You haven't addressed the questions I posed about gender being social, nor have you explained which feelings one is referring to if gender is a feeling.
Quoting Michael
Then how does one determine which psychological attributes are male or female if they occur across the sexes? Is there some study that shows the ratio in which these attributes occur with the presence of the sex parts like chromosomes and genitalia?
We also don't live in a world with unisex bathrooms. Abolishing clothes, or making all clothes unisex instead of having distinctly Women's clothes and Men's clothes, would abolish transgenderism. Your goal for a unisex society would effectively be a society in which transgenderism would not exist.
I would just like to say that I don't like using English definitions like this.
Let me explain, the English language was and is made by a person or people. While we do need specific definitions for terms, limiting the conversation through definitions just seems wrong to me. (I haven't been here the entire time so I might be off base.)
Then I was wondering about the focus on physiological attributes of certain genders. I think it had to do with appearance connecting to a sense of safety (but I may be wrong.)
There are many people who act with attributes of a different gender without transitioning. For example, and only for understanding, you have probably seen on tv somewhere gay or lesbian people acting more feminine or masculine respectively.
So gender doesn't only have to do with physiological attributes.
I explained it very clearly above.
There are sex differences in psychology.
These differences drive the development of gender expression and gender roles in society – expressions and roles which have absolutely nothing to do with karyotype and almost nothing to do with phenotype.
Almost all biological men "belong" to the same psychological/social/cultural group, and so we (also) name this psychological/social/cultural group "men".
Almost all biological women "belong" to the same psychological/social/cultural group, and so we (also) name this psychological/social/cultural group "women".
But some biological men and some biological women do not "fit" within the typical psychological/social/cultural group that members of their biological sex usually "belong" to. Some push the boundaries of one group or the other, and so identify as "gender non-conforming", some "fit" somewhere in the middle, and so identify as "non-binary", and some "fit" within the psychological/social/cultural group that is typical of the opposite biological sex, and so identify as "transgender".
It's really not that hard to understand.
What isn't the case – contrary to your continued misrepresentations – is that transgender women are "biological men who believe they are biological women" or that transgender men are "biological women who believe they are biological men".
True.
And I am asking you how it logically follows that these distinctions qualify as sexual differences if they occur across both sexes.
As I have pointed out before, biological sex is based on a combination of five traits (chromosomes,
genitals, gonads, hormones and secondary sex characteristics). Using genitals and gonads alone, more than 99.9% of people fall into two non-overlapping classes—male and female—and the other traits almost always occur with these. If you did a principal components analysis using the combination of all five traits, you’d find two widely separated clusters with very few people in between.
Do these psychological differences occur with the rest of these sexual characteristics with the same ratio (99.9%)? If so, wouldn't that mean that they are actually a biological woman or man? If not, then how can you say that these differences are based on sex? Are hair color, eye color, and skin color now based on sex too? These differences occur randomly among the sexes so are not considered characteristics of one's sex.
It seems to me that the conversation is limited when you don't have clear definitions of what it is we are talking about. Without clear definitions we end up talking past each other. Effectively, no communication occurs.
Presumably because of their prevalence. If some trait is typical of 98% of biological men but only 2% of biological women then it’s an example of a sex difference, but you’re better off asking a psychologist, not me.
I’ve linked to the article, it has a list of references, so do the research if you’re unwilling to trust it at face value.
It's true that I am not as much 'in the thick of it' as you, I also now realize that my comment doesn't exactly fit the situation.
However, what I wanted to point out was that fitting strictly to textbook definitions and using them as a tool by following them to a T seems wrong to me. However what I previously responded to was not such a situation in this case, but it did seem like that person was trying to put their own definition to the word.
These majority of those listed seem largely circumstantial for reasons I'll soon explain.
Basically, it's a list of common stereotypes. Listed as follows:
Women: More inclined to be afraid. More inclined to be passive or submissive. More emotional (positively, along the lines of empathy, understanding, or nurturing).
Men: (obviously the opposite of the above). More assertive or aggressive. More emotional (negatively, along the lines of anger, frustration, and pride).
So, let's analyze these traits in the context of modern and semi-modern societies, shall we?
So, everybody knows a father looks at his daughter unlike the way he looks at a son. While specifics may vary there is generally one common theme and that's that the daughter is "a precious little angel that has to be protected at all cost" whereas the male is a "little me who's going to have to fight and struggle to make his way in the world." So, throughout one's entire upbringing, specifically the first 5 years of life (crucial development period) this is instilled consciously and directly as well as subconsciously and by various indirect means.
This effectively explains the majority of the psychological and behavior differences, in one swing.
But I'll do one better. Even the minor "behavioral" quirks or mannerisms people don't tend to focus on much but do generally recognize as either "feminine" or "masculine." Say, putting one's hands on one's hips in frustration, for example. Women generally have larger, wider hips than men. Therefore, it's becomes a "natural" biological inclination.
Same thing for increased muscle tone for males on average. Where the insult "limp-wristed (what have you)" comes in. A man's arm is generally more large and muscular and the male wrist is generally more self-supportive than that of their female counterpart.
These both are minor, incredibly minor in their insignificance, in and of themselves, that is. Yet they seem to be, if not main, secondary biological factors (circumstantial, mind you) that determine many behaviors or inclinations toward behaviors over others.
Without getting carried away, simply put, I'm suggesting the possibility that the majority of the differences between sexes found in the article you linked are cultural, social, and otherwise "learned." I.E. they don't really mean anything other than that's how people raise their kids so that's how they turn out. If they raised them the opposite, than they would turn out the opposite, thus meaning those differences are not really scientific or intrinsic to any sex and are simply "traditions" passed on from one generation or society to the next. Not including the mannerisms or "convenience tendencies" that conform to the actual physical differences between the sexes (ie. daintiness in one's gait, hands on one's hips, etc.).
And that's even before testosterone and estrogen come into play. Some ethnotypes (races) have generally lower or higher testosterone and estrogen than others. This is due to evolutionary factors generally linked to the terrain and climate from where they "come from." If everything is nice and peaceful, it's a calm flat verdant meadow with everything "just right there", the need for testosterone was probably lower than say, a hot jungle, or rugged mountainous terrain that required constant toil each day. Should that mean certain races are more "masculine" or "famine" than others? It certainly shouldn't. But if you base everything based on those two chemicals well, to that person, it does.
It does say as much:
So I suppose there's likely a sort of feedback loop across the centuries, with any initial social and cultural differences between the sexes stemming from "natural" psychological differences, and then these social and cultural differences being the cause of further "nurtured" psychological differences which in turn drive further social and cultural differences.
You're getting a little speculative there.
Yep.
It’s interesting to consider how and why the social and cultural differences between men and women have developed over time. I suspect things were very different in the Paleolithic.
:up:
The article you cited leads with the following sentence:
"Sex differences in psychology are differences in the mental functions and behaviors of the sexes and are due to a complex interplay of biological, developmental, and cultural factors."
This causually relates (i.e. "due to") psychology to biology. This statement seems obvious, so I don't follow your argument that gender behavior "has absolutely nothing to do with karotype." While it's obvious some biological individuals don't conform with typical expected gender roles, the high rate of conformity certainly suggests a causual biological/gender relationship that requires the existence of certain variables (i.e. developmental and cultural factors) to disrupt.
To argue otherwise just seems to create a radical environmental influence position, stating that gender expression and biology only correlate due to social pressure and nothing else. The observable affect of testosterone alone seems to contradict this, which is a direct product of karotype, coming from the XY created testes.
It's your argument. You're the one that needs to support it, not me. You're the one that simply accepts what your told without question.
There is some research that suggests in European populations women are twice as likely to be blonde than men, but we don't say that blonde hair and not-blonde hair are sex differences.
It's not that. Michael can't seem to decide which definition of gender he is using - the biological one or the non-biological one. He is essentially making category mistakes.
I didn't see any pushback on this. So are we to assume that your ulterior motive here is the eradicate transgenderism by applying unisex policies across the board and to have men physically closer to women when they have their pants down?
We separate bathrooms by sex because it is an area where we uncover our sex parts. It is obvious why we categorize urinating with sex because they use the same parts. Gender, as separate from sex and biology, does not share those same intimate relations, so would play no role in determining which bathroom you use. Your urinary parts is what separates bathrooms, not how you dress. It just seems creepy to advocate for men to be physically closer to women when their pants are down.
Which is to say that gender changes over time and cultures. So if a person travels to a different culture or to a different time, does their gender change? The "spectrum" of gender as a social construct exists as the relation between cultures and times, not particular feelings in an individual (and therefore not psychological), so changing genders would require you to move to a different culture or time, not changing your feelings. So which is it, is gender a social construct - a spectrum of societal expectations of the sexes, or is it a spectrum of various feelings an individual has?
If gender is psychological then provide some examples that are clearly psychological (which would just mean that they are biological) instead of being clearly social/cultural - like wearing a dress and high heels is.
Which is why I said it makes sense to let trans women who have had bottom surgery use the women’s bathroom and trans men who have had bottom surgery use the men’s bathroom.
Quoting Harry Hindu
It’s both, which is why the article on gender that I directed you to says “gender is the range of social, psychological, cultural, and behavioral aspects of being a man (or boy), woman (or girl), or third gender.”
Quoting Harry Hindu
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_identity
Quoting Harry Hindu
It’s not my argument. It’s what the experts in psychology and psychiatry have determined. If you think that they're wrong then the burden is on you to explain where they’ve gone wrong. I no more have to support their claims than I have to support the claims of biologists when trying to educate someone on evolution.
And this is the fundamental problem with your position. You seem to question the very existence of gender (as something distinct from biological sex) despite what the experts say and despite the existence of transgender people.
It's one thing to argue that sports teams, bathrooms, prisons, etc. ought be divided by biological sex regardless of gender identity – and as this is a political matter you're well within your rights to – but to deny that gender identity is even a thing strikes me as willful ignorance.
What I mean is that tuxedos being “men’s clothes” and dresses being “women’s clothes” is entirely a social and cultural construct and has nothing to do with a person’s DNA. And the same for other social and cultural differences between the sexes.
Certainly many psychological differences between the sexes are influenced by karyotype - to the extent that karyotype influences hormones and that nature trumps nurture - and these psychological differences may explain why certain gender roles and gender expressions are the way they are - which is what I was explaining in that comment.
Well shoot why not a fourth gender? Or a fifth. Or a sixth. Or a 12th while we're at it! This is not slippery slope fallacy, this is what people will attempt to argue for. A limit must be drawn lest mankind wander forever lost in a dystopian deluge of his own making.
Well, yes. The Bugis society recognizes five genders, and has so for at least 600 years.
Quoting Outlander
Why? There's no singularly correct way for society and culture to be structured. You seem to have some Western bias, thinking that it's only appropriate to group people according to biological sex and not in other ways.
Here we go again with conflating gender with biology, which leaves out those that have not had surgery.
Quoting Michael
But you just spoke about gender as biology (by having surgery) and now it is back to gender as non-biological. You are being inconsistent in your use of the term, "gender".
I have also asked for examples of gender as something psychological. I have already shown an example of gender as something cultural (sexist tropes). So I'm still waiting on you to provide an example of what you mean. Just tell me what you mean when you assert you are a man or woman? Why can't you do that simple thing?
Quoting Michael
I'm not even saying they're wrong. I'm asking a question about how they can they reach the conclusions they have when the evidence they provide doesn't include necessary information to reach that conclusion and is contradictory. I asked how it logically follows that these distinctions qualify as sexual differences if they occur across both sexes. This is required information and the fact that it is not included is suspicious. The fact that I cannot find the information is also suspicious - kind of like how that study that showed the negative effects of transitioning children was swept under the rug. I have shown evidence that scientists are not always truthful and can be manipulated by politics as much as anyone else, yet you keep pleading to authority when I have shown that the authority you are pleading to has not provided all the necessary information and has been caught keeping necessary information out of the public view.
And when we live in an age of disinformation propagated by the authorities on both sides of the political spectrum, why would you not at least question authority than hides necessary information to claim what they are claiming?
I'm sympathetic to this, but when we label someone as "man", along with a physical description of a male (genitalia, chromosomes, etc.) that label also denotes that, on average, men are stronger than women and more violent and predatory. Would you agree?
There is some research that suggests that on average, in European populations women are twice as likely to be blonde than men, but we don't say that blonde hair and not-blonde hair are sex differences.
Biological sex is based on a combination of five traits (chromosomes, genitals, gonads, hormones and secondary sex characteristics). Using genitals and gonads alone, more than 99.9% of people fall into two non-overlapping classes—male and female—and the other traits almost always occur with these.
Women can be violent and predatory. So the question is, what is the threshold by which we define which characteristics are sexual differences, and which aren't? The fact that we even have a 99% ratio of different characteristics occurring naturally together must speak to what it means to be a woman or a man independent of our use of language. Everything else would be decided by one's culture.
I’m not conflating gender with biology. I am simply pointing out that if we separate bathrooms according on one’s sex organs, as you say we should, then it makes sense to allow those with an artificial penis to use the same bathroom as those with a natural penis and to allow those with an artificial vagina to use the same bathroom as those with a natural vagina.
Included in those with artificial genitals are trans people who have had surgery, intersex people who have had surgery, and cisgender people who have had surgery after an unfortunate accident with a buzz saw.
Quoting Harry Hindu
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_identity
Quoting Harry Hindu
If you don’t trust what the experts have determined then I don’t see how I can help. As I alluded to before, I can no more prove that there are sex differences in psychology than I can prove that humans evolved via natural selection from single-celled organisms. All I can do is point you in the direction of the research. What you do with that is out of my control.
Separate bathrooms is not just about sex organs and the place of females in society is not based just on sex organs.
I find the whole dismissive attitude to female experience in society quite sad. Luckily females in modern western liberal countries have it fairly good but there are still threats to females and unique challenges for females that means some areas of society have to be barred from males.
Harry Hindu is the one who said "we separate bathrooms by sex because it is an area where we uncover our sex parts" and so I am simply addressing the implications of this reasoning.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
I'm not dismissing it. But you certainly seem to be dismissing transgender experience.
You continue to think that transgender women are psychologically, socially, and culturally equivalent to cisgender men simply because they share the same set of chromosomes, gonads, and genitals. Your view is mistaken.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
And there are threats to and unique challenges for transgender men and transgender women.
You are 100% dismissing women and their experience.
You have dismissed the concerns of females in spaces where they are may feel awkward and vulnerable. The toilet is one of those places.
I reject the notion that man can become a woman. I agree with you there.
I'm not dismissing it.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
Again with the equivocation. Nobody is claiming that a biological man can become a biological woman or that a biological woman can become a biological man. What is claimed is that biological men can have a female gender identity, that biological women can have a male gender identity, and that certain social divisions ought be made by gender identity rather than biological sex.
You want males to enter their exclusive places. Is that not dismissing it?
Quoting Michael
I think that is a meaningless concept and dismisses what it is to be female.
I am questioning the claim that certain bathrooms ought be exclusive to biological women.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
So you deny the reality that gender is distinct from sex?
Dismissing their concerns and shared experience.
I'm not dismissing it.
But as it may interest you:
I don't believe you (and similar advocates) use the concept of gender correctly. Gender is the societal differences between the sexes. If everyone else in the world thought it was good thing and agreed I would still see a man in dress. once all of the issues women face are ironed out and females don't feel threatened or vulnerable then maybe men would have access to exclusive places.
An example would be a night club that attracts the trans/queer community. If women in those places are comfortable then there would be no issue. Until then men need excluding. These are private places and probably exclude most of the "bloke" element anyway.
Sport is a different matter but there would be nothing wrong in setting up other organised leagues where women accept the risks and disadvantages of playing with men.
Many woman won't have a problem with it. like most things in society it isn't binary.
Many women won't have an issue walking through a park late at night.
Looks like the majority of women disagree with you. Do you dismiss that?
Disagree with me on what?
These societal differences are distinct from any biological differences, so clearly gender is distinct from sex. And people can identify as belonging to the gender that is not typical for their biological sex.
Allowing men into women's bathrooms.
https://yougov.co.uk/politics/articles/51545-where-does-the-british-public-stand-on-transgender-rights-in-202425
When including transwomen who have had gender-affirming surgery, 45% of women say that transwomen should be allowed to use the women's bathroom compared to 34% who say they shouldn't (with 21% saying they don't know). 45 is greater than 34.
So this ties into my claim to Harry Hindu that we ought to at least let trans women who have had bottom surgery use the women's bathroom and trans men who have had bottom surgery use the men's bathroom.
But what's most interesting I think is that men are much less tolerant of transwomen using women's facilities than women are. I don't know if that's because men are in general less tolerant of transgender people or because they're white knighting.
No it isn't. The gender is reflection of the societal differences between the sexes. The word was hijacked by the muddle headed. Quoting Michael
read the link
And these societal differences have nothing to do with biology. Gender is distinct from sex.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
Ah, so public opinion changed between 2022 and 2024. It's interesting that there's such a large swing in just two years. There's even a majority opposition to trans men using the men's bathroom, and again with men being much less tolerant than women. But speaking as a man, I don't care what other men think. Trans men ought be allowed to use the men's bathroom.
The age breakdown is also interesting, with the majority of 18-24 year olds supporting trans people using their preferred bathroom, and every other age group being the opposite. The other biggest determinants are who you voted for (more Lib Dems support it than oppose, whereas more Conservatives oppose it than support) and whether or not you know a trans person.
I wonder how much of the opposition is reminiscent of historical (and even current) homophobia and gay panic.
The person's biology has a huge influence on the development someone. Society treats the sexes different and certain aspects of society are governed by a person's sex. There are reasons why it is a societal taboo for men to hit women.
Men growing up will not have the same experiences women. these forge the person you become. The influences are changing on a daily basis but until there has been some massive social engineering the status quo will (and should) remain.
Quoting Michael
I doubt many men would care.
And yet the poll you linked to says that 51% of men oppose trans men using the men's toilets (with only 33% in support). So evidently most men do care.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
Yes, but there's more to biology, and in particular neurology, than just sex chromosomes and genitals.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
And transgender women growing up will not have the same experiences as cisgender men, and transgender men growing up will not have the same experiences as cisgender women. It's not all about sex chromosomes and genitals. I don't know why you can't accept this. We are not merely biological automatons. We are conscious organisms with complex psychologies and personal identities, with gender identity "develop[ing] surprisingly rapidly in the early childhood years, and in the majority of instances appears to become at least partially irreversible by the age of 3 or 4."
That surprises me.Quoting Michael
Of course, I've never said otherwise.Quoting Michael
I can accept it. people can be whoever they wish.
Quoting Michael
I agree with this too. people can identify how they wish. They are still male and female and males and females are seen different by society and this needs recognising in certain spaces.
You are denying this difference and wish to play down the woman's experience in modern society. That's what a man does, many of them would argue.
I’m not playing down women’s experiences. I’m simply explaining that “women’s experiences” is not reducible to “the experience of humans with an XX karyotype, ovaries, and a vagina.”
Women as a gender is distinct from women as a sex, even if they almost always correspond. The fact that they almost always correspond has caused you to mistakenly conflate the two.
No matter how you repeat the same thing over and over doesn't alter the fact that you wish to allow males into female spaces. playing down the concerns females have at males gaining access to to places where females feel vulnerable and uncomfortable in the presence of males.
Luckily, society seems to have caught up and is clamping down.
I wish to allow transgender women to use the women’s bathroom and transgender men to use the men’s bathroom.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
I don’t play it down. I just also acknowledge that trans women feel vulnerable and uncomfortable using the men’s bathroom, that trans men feel vulnerable and uncomfortable using the women’s bathroom, that trans people are at a greater risk of abuse when forced to use the bathroom contrary to their gender identity, and that despite the dog whistle, cisgender women are not put at risk by trans-inclusive bathroom policies.
Quoting Michael
Sounds like you are.
No link between trans-inclusive policies and bathroom safety, study finds
Are you saying women are stupid to feel that they should exclude men from their exclusive places?
I’m saying that:
a) cisgender women are not put at risk by trans-inclusive bathroom policies, and
b) trans people are put at risk of abuse when forced to use the bathroom contrary to their gender identity
Are you saying that (a) and/or (b) are false? Or are you saying that you don’t care that they’re true?
I'm saying (a) is false but even if it wasn't men should not be allowed in women's exclusive spaces.
Even if (b) is true, men should not be allowed in women's exclusive spaces.
Why should women have to compromise for men?
The evidence shows otherwise.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
Yet again with the equivocation.
The claim is that no bathroom should be exclusive to a single biological sex. If bathrooms are to be divided then they ought be divided by gender identity. As such, there are “female gender bathrooms” and “male gender bathrooms”, with “female gender bathrooms” exclusive to both cisgender and transgender women and “male gender bathrooms” exclusive to both cisgender and transgender men.
The studies show that this is the safer option for everyone.
One study by a Gender studies lecturer is not the 10 Commandments.
As I said even if true it doesn't change the narrative.
So women should stand aside as usual.
I have no idea what you mean here.
I’m simply pointing out the fact that it is safer for everyone if trans people are allowed to use their preferred bathroom.
So either you disagree with the facts or you don’t actually care about people’s safety at all. Perhaps you’re just using that as a dog whistle to push an anti-trans agenda.
I really don't think you do.
So women are uncomfortable with men in their bathrooms and have to put up with it?
You don't appear to be concerned about women's fears. Perhaps you’re just using that as a dog whistle to push an misogynistic agenda.
...but it would not include most trans-people as most trans have not had surgery. So you would still force a man wearing a dress into the men's bathroom.
And your proposal to have unisex bathrooms eliminates the trans-persons ability to affirm their gender by using a binary bathroom. Trans-genderism reinforces the binary gender social model and condones sexism.
So either you haven't thought about the consequences of your proposed solution, or you have an ulterior motive to actually eradicate transgenderism, not support it. Which means that you are acting like you care for the transgender movement but are actually opposed to it and are using it as a means to get men closer to women when their pants are down.
Quoting Michael
If you are dedicated to pleading to an authority that leaves out the necessary data that would actually show what they are claiming then I don't see how I can help.
Sure. I did mention that hormones are one of the determining characteristics of sexual differences, so you haven't contradicted anything I've said.
Let me just reiterate here that we're talking about sexual differences, not gender differences if sex and gender are not the same thing.
I’m not the one claiming that we ought divide bathrooms by sex organs; you are.
I’m simply pointing out that if we divide bathrooms by sex organs then it makes sense to allow trans men who have had surgery to use the men’s bathroom and trans women who have had surgery to use the women’s bathroom.
Surely one’s karyotype is irrelevant, as are the gentitals one was born with (and no longer have)?
If you're not conflating gender and sex then why are you calling people who modified their sexual biology trans-gender?
In proposing unisex bathrooms you are taking away the trans-gender person's reasons for having surgery in the first place - to affirm their gender.
I’m not.
You claimed that the reason we have separate bathrooms for men and women is because men and women have different sex organs. And it is a simple fact that some trans people have genital surgery. So I’m asking you which bathroom they should use after having genital surgery.
Quoting Harry Hindu
I’m not.
You are.
You are contradicting yourself. If gender and sex are separate then why would genital surgery be called gender-affirming?
No, I’m not.
It’s a very simple question, Harry. If you are in charge of deciding who is allowed to use which bathroom, then would you require that trans men who have had genital surgery and now have an artificial penis use the men’s bathroom or the women’s bathroom?
It's just another dispiriting pious measure nailed to the cross of trans inclusion.
I doubt any woman would be happy with having to go to the loo after a couple of blokes on a morning after the night before. Lasses have a sanctuary on a night out to have a laugh with their mates and maybe escape from people they prefer not to interact with. It's just another part of culture sacrificed to include people who want the world to bend to their whim.
Have a women's bathroom and an open bathroom. Have women's sport and open sport.
All inclusive. Sorted.
You see, you are the one going on about bathrooms when I'm talking about the relationship between gender and sex. You're putting the cart before the horse.
Because that’s what we were both discussing. You said "we separate bathrooms by sex because it is an area where we uncover our sex parts."
I just want to understand how artificial sex parts factor into your separation.
Quoting Harry Hindu
And that's been addressed several times before.
Sex "is the biological trait that determines whether a sexually reproducing organism produces male or female gametes."
Gender "is the range of social, psychological, cultural, and behavioral aspects of being a man (or boy), woman (or girl), or third gender."
In most cases one's gender is determined by one's sex, but given the existence of transgender people – and societies with more than two genders – this is not a necessity.
I already said that intersex people can use whatever bathroom they want. People that have had genital surgery are effectively intersex because they still retain some of the sex parts they were born with.
So, just to be clear, in talking about people that have had genital surgery, we're talking about intersex people, not trans-gendered people.
And what about trans people who have had genital surgery?
Your conflating sex and gender again. If I said that intersex people can use whichever bathroom they want, then why would their gender status matter - if sex and gender are separate?
Quoting Michael
By having genital surgery the trans-person is asserting their gender is determined by their sex.
Now, what about trans people that haven't had surgery? Which bathroom should they use? And what are they saying determines their gender - which social, psychological, cultural, and behavioral aspects are they referring to - specifically?
No, I'm not. I am simply acknowledging the fact that some transgender people have genital surgery. According to this, 25-50% of transgender men have genital surgery and 4-13% of transgender women have genital surgery.
So, if bathroom usage is dictated by sex parts – which is your claim, not mine – then do you accept that transgender men who have had genital surgery should use the men's bathroom and transgender women who have had genital surgery should use the women's bathroom?
Quoting Harry Hindu
No they're not. The transgender woman is fully aware that she is biologically male and the transgender man is fully aware that he is biologically female.
The very fact that they identity as being transgender is an acknowledgement that their gender is not the typical gender of their biological sex.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Transgender women should use the women's bathroom and transgender men should use the men's bathroom.
Quoting Harry Hindu
There's no list of necessary and sufficient conditions. I've linked you to the relevant places that explain it in more detail:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_role
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_expression
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_identity
And some people that are not transgender have had genital surgery, as you have pointed out and apparently forgotten. So what does gender status have to do with using the bathroom if gender has nothing to do with biology? Why is it so important that trans people get to use the bathroom rather than the non-trans that have had surgery? It must be because you continue to conflate sex with gender in one moment then claim they are separate in another.
Also, you have been very happy to show specific examples of sex with your use of "penis", "vagina", "testes" etc., but have yet to show ONE specific example of gender as something social, psychological, cultural, and behavioral.
Quoting Michael
Thanks for supporting my argument that the number of trans-people that conflate sex and gender are growing and you're just parroting this conflation (delusion).
Quoting Michael
Aren't they saying they are psychologically and culturally male/female? Isn't that the point of contention here? I'm still waiting on specific examples.
Can someone be non-biologically female male? If not, then why the qualifier, "biological"? If so, then please provide a specific example.
Quoting Michael
Which is to say gender is anything other than sex. Gender = not-sex. That's helpful. :roll:
.
What if there was an android with an artificial penis, which bathroom should they use? Please don't bring up the slippery slope. YOU are the one that used the term, "artificial", so you should define exactly how you're using it. I'm the one saying it's not any kind of penis, artificial or natural.
What are you talking about?
You claimed that sex parts dictate which bathroom one can use such that people with a penis use one bathroom and people with a vagina use another bathroom.
I just want to know if you accept that a transgender man with an artifical penis should use the men's bathroom.
It's a simple "yes" or "no" answer.
Quoting Harry Hindu
I've linked to various articles that explain gender, gender roles, gender expression, and gender identity. Do the reading.
Define "artificial". Which bathroom should an android with an artificial penis use?
Quoting Michael
It doesn't show anything specific, which is what I'm asking for. You were more than happy to provide specific examples of sex. Why so reluctant to show just one example of gender as something non-biological? Sounds like someone with a sex fetish that has no idea what they're talking about when it comes to gender and are just using it as cover for their real intention of being closer to women with their pants down.
The result of genital surgery.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Androids aren't people, they're machines. So there's no "should" or "shouldn't". We can do whatever we like. We could make androids use bathrooms only for androids or we could make them use whichever bathroom is closest or we could make androids with an artificial penis use the men's bathroom.
Or we could just not create androids that need to urinate?
What is the point of this question?
Quoting Harry Hindu
Because there is no specific thing. Society and culture is complex. The social and cultural differences between men and women (or third genders) changes over time and from place to place. And again, there's no set of necessary and sufficient conditions even at a singular time and place.
Do you deny that there are social differences between men and women, independent of their karyotype and genitals? Are we are gender-blind outside of reproduction and reproductive health?
I mean, while I can't answer for @Harry Hindu I feel the following a likely sentiment or inevitable question.
Do children not grow up wishing they were, I don't know, Superman or something? Some greater being with superpowers. Of course they do. That's why the genre and market of such is so popular. People want to be something they're not. And that's fine, as a child. But when you grow up and start physically and irreversibly altering your body over a delusion, something that's just not real or factual, it's just not right mate. Especially for those whose brains have not fully developed, which all science says does not occur until AT LEAST 25-- minimum.
Say I have a pet cat and I'm amazed at how high it can jump and the how it always lands on its feet. Just because in some fictional future one might be able to get implants that allow one to behave or interact with the world similarly, doesn't mean it should be done. Again limits have to be drawn, for the good of humanity.
Or, sure, someone who's taller than me. Or much larger and stronger. People shouldn't be chasing something they're not, they need to be content with the hand they were dealt and recognize it as a unique human experience that they have the privilege to enjoy, even if it is less than favorable.
What kind of world are we going to hand off to our children? One as its supposed to be, where people are people, yes with their faults and on occasion undesired features, shame, and everything in between. Or some dystopia where one person feels unwell or is maladjusted to life and wants to become a cyborg with 3 arms or an extra set of genitalia or less or more or I mean, it's just absurd. Limits must be drawn. Just because something can be done (bizarre and extreme surgery), doesn't mean it should.
Those exceedingly rare cases 1 out of like 500 million who have true chemical and biological androgynous syndrome, that's one thing. Some dude who just woke up one day wanting different body parts for no logical reason, that's just not something that needs to be taken seriously. Not in a world of real issues and tragedy such as human trafficking and starvation. I'm sorry.
What delusion?
Quoting Outlander
It's also not something that actually happens. This is a ridiculous strawman.
That you're something you're not. It is common for men to shame other men and compare those they either do not respect or deem inferior to them or who are smaller than them as being "women" or "like a girl."
Just because someone is ostracized or otherwise feels out of place or "not a man/woman" ie. not a normal member of his or her group who fits in, doesn't mean that person is actually gender dysmorphic. They just don't feel normal because they either are not physically and get treated differently as a result or other persons have convinced them of such by sheer will alone. It's a tragedy. Plain and simple.
Quoting Michael
Dude. That's literally what the whole discussion is about. Yes, it is very ridiculous. But this is the topic we're discussing. Why are you doing this? Acting like that's not what the majority of people who have "gender-affirming" surgery effectively go through mentally, if not much more simplified. You're clearly intelligent enough to not have to avoid the topic. I'll let those viewing make their own decision as to your motives and reasoning for playing dumb.
So what does the transgender man falsely believe himself to be?
Quoting Outlander
No, it isn't. Transgender people don't just "wake up one day wanting different body parts for no logical reason".
I'm going to quote from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_identity both for you and for @Harry Hindu because it seems that neither of you actually understand the issue at all.
For better or for worse, societies tend to establish gender roles – norms of behaviour deemed appropriate or desirable for individuals based on their biological sex, but norms of behaviour which don't actually have anything to do with biological sex at all.
In the very early years of human development – and in particular at a time when we're unlikely to even be aware of sex organs different from our own – we come to identify as "belonging" to one of these gender roles. The particular gender role that we come to identify as belonging to is determined in part by our genetics, hormones, and brain structure.
And sometimes a biological boy comes to identify as belonging to the gender role typically associated with biological girls, and sometimes a biological girl comes to identify as belonging to the gender role typically associated with biological boys – and this is not wrong because these gender roles are a social construct that have no direct connection to DNA or reproductive organs at all.
Born something he (or she, I don't indulge or humor nonsense let alone keep track of such) wasn't. How simple is that to grasp? Sure, it's natural to wish you were a few inches taller if you happen to be short, or a bit larger if you happen to be small, or much more wealthy if you happen to be poor, etc. At the end of the day, you were born as you were, not necessarily as you desire. And that's all there is to it.
You should not reinforce people's unhealthy delusions and obsessions, that only validates the only thing going on here, which is a lie. A delusion. At best a mistake and inaccurate analysis of one's self. It will never be anything more than that.
Quoting Michael
All of that is fine, well fine enough, as there's more important things to deal with, up until the point that one considers it logical to permanently and irreversibly alter one's non-disabled and fully healthy body and form, most critically those under the age of what is socially considered a functional and legal adult.. That is what you're blatantly avoiding, my good sir. And I believe you are doing such intentionally for whatever reason that is again up to the public writ-large to determine why and perhaps what should be done as a result.
Which is what? Does the transgender man believe himself to be a fish? I need an actual example of a delusion.
Quoting Outlander
Not every transgender person has gender dysphoria, and according to this, "in studies that assessed transgender men and women as an aggregate, chest surgery has been reported at rates between 8–25%, and genital surgery at 4–13%".
And whether you like it or not, hormone therapy and surgery can be effective treatments. You can't just pretend that gender dysphoria isn't real or can be safely ignored or can only be treated by psychotherapy.
As for "permanently and irreversibly alter[ing] one's non-disabled and fully healthy body and form", well so too is a salpingectomy, but if a woman does not wish to have children and opts to have one then that's her concern and nobody else's, and they ought be allowed to have one.
Gender refers to the socially constructed roles, behaviors, expressions, and identities of girls, women, boys, men, and gender-diverse people. It's a distinct concept from biological sex, which refers to physical attributes like chromosomes, hormones, and reproductive organs. Gender is a social construct, meaning it's created and shaped by society and culture, with norms and expectations varying across time and different societies.
Gender Identity:
Gender identity: An individual's internal sense of self as male, female, both, neither, or another identity.
Transgender: A term for individuals whose gender identity differs from the sex they were assigned at birth.
Nonbinary: A term for individuals who do not identify as exclusively male or female.
Genderfluid: A term for individuals whose gender identity fluctuates over time.
Gender as a behavior is fluid and changing. It may change over an individuals lifetime. Of course women dressing in suits, smoking cigars, drinking whiskey and using vulgar language do not attract as much social approbation as men wearing dresses and high heels but still gender behavior is a choice and in a truly free country should be tolerated even if not promoted or endorsed.
Biological sex is a different and more complex matter. Most think it is simple male or female but they are unfamiliar it seems with chromosomal abnormalities, true intersex and the various differences in sexual differentiation which can occur. Try watching the end of "Conclave" persistant mullerian duct snydrome Consult wikipedia on disorders (bad term) of sexual differentiation for a long list. So those who spout the there are only two sexes mantra merely display ignorance of the complexity of biology and natures endless variations.
I also suspect most have never dealt with individuals who display true gender dysphoria but telling them they are mistaken and psychologically disturbed is no solution at all. The rate of depression and suicide in this population is tragic.
There's male, female, and what else? Various disorders where the person has characteristics of both sexes? That's not really a third sex though.
It is and we don’t.
Which means that an individual's gender is determined by society, not by the individual like sex is.
Quoting Michael
Yes because in speaking of social differences, we are speaking about differences in societies. When speaking about differences between a man and a woman, we are speaking about biological differences. To conflate the two would be practicing sexism.
Quoting Michael
If an artificial human isn't a human then artificial penises aren't penises.
What if a woman has a dildo (an artificial penis) in her purse - does she get to use the men's restroom?
Quoting Michael
Yet you say that there is no specific example of expressing one's gender:
Quoting Michael
You are the one that has created the circumstances of gender being this open-ended thing that can mean anything - as long as it's not sex, so it isn't a straw-man until you provide some concrete examples.
How is 1) achieved if
Quoting Michael
?
If gender as social expectations of the sexes is determined by sex and we aren't aware of other sex organs, then how can we learn the characteristics of gender at an early age? How does a toddler learn why some people where dresses and some wear pants if they aren't aware of other sex organs?
You can't even stay consistent with your own arguments (oh wait, I forget, they are the scientists' arguments and scientists are prophets from on high and should never be questioned -which is how you distance yourself from your own contradictions).
Quoting Michael
That they are a man. Why else would they be calling themselves a man? And yes, many trans-gender people do not like the trans- qualifier. They actually consider themselves a man or a woman.
Yet again with the equivocation.
You are correct to say that the transgender man is not a biological man but you are incorrect to suggest that the transgender man believes himself to be a biological man. So your claim that he suffers from a delusion stems from a fallacy.
I assume that @Outlander is making the same mistake.
Quoting Harry Hindu
I don't quite understand your question. Are you suggesting that 3 year olds do in fact know that some of the children in their class have a penis and some have a vagina, and that this biological difference dictates social differences? Or are you suggesting that 3 year olds don't understand that some of the children in their class are called "boys" and some are called "girls", and that those who are called "boys" and those who are called "girls" tend to wear different clothes and play with different toys and are referred to using different pronouns?
Quoting Harry Hindu
It doesn’t matter what you call it. Which bathroom should the transgender man who has had genital surgery use? The women's bathroom or the men's bathroom? Given that you mentioned sex parts to explain why we have separate bathrooms for men and women it’s a pertinent question.
I think the gender/sex split makes sense to differentiate performative roles vs biological ones. However, I also think that gender roles in general tend to be inherently limiting when enforced (socially or otherwise), and that gender roles by their nature tend to end up at least socially enforced. Realistically I believe post-gender thinking is the best way forward, though I'm not sure how possible it would be to convince people of this. I think we are capable as a society of accommodating our various biological differences without getting as hung up as we do about what parts people have or if we think how they act matches their parts. That said, people seem to *really really* like gender roles.
This goes back to the heart of the debate, why would you have to "convince" someone of something that doesn't actually result in any benefit or alleviation of burden? Something that's not organic. Sure, I'll be the first person to agree that medicine, that is to say, the best path forward, in and of itself, may not taste good or otherwise be pleasurable at the start. Same with any effort, exercise, or endeavor. But why people do all of the above, things that may be at first or even overall unpleasant, is because all of these things result in one simple thing: result itself. It's "self-evident" that exercise, though often unpleasant and grueling offers benefit. Same with hard work, effort, and dedication. So, if your belief is not "possible" to justify (at least in your current understanding) I would have to ask the obvious question: what makes you think it justified to hold to begin with? :chin:
Quoting MrLiminal
The best part about modern society is that everyone is equal. Provided you follow the law. You can walk around thinking you're a cat and have a right to pee anywhere, but in reality, if you break the law, you will be placed under arrest or otherwise suffer real and tangible punishment toward your person or asset. That's the only way to get people to behave. And that's how the world we live in is.
In an ideal world, rude people or those unable to behave civilly would have been bred out along time ago. Problem is, this is a post-war world with 5,000 years of war, conquest, and various other immoralities. So, it's populated with the worst of the worst. That's what we're working with here. The solution is fairly obvious but as far as politically correct things going forward: it's about following the law and being a law-abiding citizen. Ensuring those who have true value in civil society (intellect, morality, compassion, heroism, etc.) are allowed to reproduce in greater numbers while those who are not slowly dwindle in number, thus making the world a better place for all and preventing it from becoming a hellish dystopia no one really wants to live in.
Also, glad to see you back after your 5 month absence. Feel free to post in the Shoutbox as far as what you've been up to. :point:
I think there are several examples of ways of thinking we have managed to convince most people out of historically. Human sacrifice and slavery were once fairly common compared to now (not that gender discussion is at that level, of course). I would also argue that a post-gender way of thinking could result in an easing of burden, it's just so intrinsically linked into how we currently think that it's difficult to see the ways it limits us. However, I also acknowledge that there are downsides and pitfalls, as on some level I also believe gender norms serve as a baseline for many people as a way of orienting themselves in reality and explaining who they are to themselves. Tbh I'm not convinced it would be a full on improvement either, as I think attempts at post-gender thought sometimes fall into the trap of inventing new social roles for people to fill that then start to become increasingly solidified by time and social pressure. I just can't help but think that we put so much effort into gender/sex discussions as a society that it ultimately distracts us from more universal issues. But then I still think of myself as a man, so maybe I'm part of the problem I'm describing, lol.
Quoting Outlander
I agree with this and your following paragraph. I'm not really talking about politically correct stuff here though per say. When I say "post-gender" thought what I mean to say is that gender roles would not be expectations so much as statistical observations, while still acknowledging sexual differences. As you said, everyone is more or less free to do what they want within the confines of the law, I'm talking more about transforming the social expectations of people. Kind of like how back in the 90s there was that big push to let boys and girls play with each other's respective toy sets. Tomboys and letting boys play with easy-bake oven without it being weird, kind of thing. I think there will be obvious statistical patterns of behavior that will arise along sex lines, but my point is removing the expectation of it. We as humans are hard coded to see patterns, and often we let the patterns become expectations, and then expectations can become beliefs. I think challenging the expectation is good while acknowledging that not everyone is an outlier.
Quoting Outlander
Thank you for noticing. Not much to tell, honestly. My interests can just be kind of flighty sometimes.
Quoting prothero
Quoting Malcolm Parry
I've been interested in the biology of sex since the 1980ies, but I'm really bad at understanding biology. However, reading about biology from biologists, I did get the impression that the way we abstract from biological sex is cultural. So the "fact" that there are men and women is a gendered abstraction that biologists sometimes find useful and sometimes don't. Biological facts are biological facts, but the biological categories we use to make sense of biological facts are theory-bound and often reflect what we're interested in. Sex is sex, but the way we research sex is - in part - gendered.
I've been looking online, right now, for examples of what biologists have to say about the topic, and surprisingly the most interesting (to me) yield comes from a Quora page, as an answer to a question about biological sex, which confusingly uses the word "gender" and thus also gives rise to the expected reactions. A few biologists do talk about sex, though. A selective sample (usually not the entire post):
Link
James McInnes:
Comment: I'm curious about the "classification schemes". Everything else sounds familiar, and is the stuff I sort of understand on the whole, but not in detail. One of the things I never properly understood is the difference between "intersex" and "ambigous". The language here gets very biological, and I'd need to dive deeper here than I'm willing. I'm content to know that biologists (some? most? all?) understand the difference.
Rik Wouters:
Comment: Non-expert with a practical intuition of how many categories are useful.
Quinn Copeland:
Comment: Male/female binary, with deviation being defined strictly in terms of "passing on of genes".
Oliver Caspari:
Comment: Statistical distribution.
Adriana Heguy:
Comments: Left out paragraphs talking about gender. This sort of response is, in my enteriely anecdotal experience, pretty common with non-human biologists, and less common though not by much with human biologists. Take that with a grain of salt; I'm unaware of any studies on the topic, so I have nothing to corroborate.
Make of this what you will. My own take on this is that even when a stark biological binary is useful, it's strictly centered on reproduction with very limited validity outside of this topic. Even then, it stops at "male" and "female" - and I'm not sure how we would relate reproductive systems to individuals. "Man" and "Woman" are terms meant to describe individuals, and that's a step up the abstraction ladder from the only clear binary that is useful. In effect, "man" and "woman" are gender terms, not sex terms, and that's what we care about. Any appeal to biology feels like an appeal to authority, rather than an appeal to biological sexual facts.
So, yeah, I'm on the whole with prothero here: It's not really purely male and purely female; it's a matter of how you classify stuff. I'm curious about trans biology (we might learn more), and insisting on a binary + deviance might hinder us getting a clear view of field. Facts are meaningless without theory.
There are males and females, based on SRY activation and this is the earliest, most obvious determinant. It is also what is taught to biologists as best I can tell. Other forms of 'sex' are specified where 'the sex of the organism' is an absolute categorical 1 or 0. This also applies to all 'intersex' individuals.
This means that everything in those responses makes sense, and isn't unreasonable. What is unreasonable is to simply defer to 'grey area' instead of figuring out the best uses of words for our purposes. So, disambiguating gender has been done extremely well, by almost everyone but weirdos.
Defining sex is actually just as simple. As is determination. There's no ambiguity, if you use the fundamental, non-ambiguous "classification". The only other one which would make sense is whether or not the organism produces gametes (and which ones) but we see hte flaws there, i assume.
Sex chromosome anomalies belong to a group of genetic conditions that are caused or affected by the loss, damage or addition of one or both sex chromosomes (also called gonosomes).
In humans this may refer to:
45, X, also known as Turner syndrome
45,X/46,XY mosaicism, also known as X0/XY mosaicism and mixed gonadal dysgenesis
46, XX/XY
47, XXX, also known as trisomy X or triple X syndrome
47, XXY, also known as Klinefelter syndrome
47, XYY, also known as Jacobs syndrome
48, XXXX, also known as tetrasomy X
48, XXXY
48, XXYY
48, XYYY
49, XXXXY
49, XYYYY
49, XXXXX, also known as pentasomy X
46, XX gonadal dysgenesis
46, XY gonadal dysgenesis, also known as Swyer syndrome
46, XX male syndrome, also known as de la Chapelle syndrome
In this list, the karyotype is summarized by the number of chromosomes, followed by the sex chromosomes present in each cell. (In the second and third cases the karyotype varies from cell to cell, while in the last three cases, the genotype is normal but the phenotype is not.)
Sex chromosome mosaicism, a genetic condition, means an individual has different cell lines with varying numbers or types of sex chromosomes. It's not uncommon, with the most frequent forms being 45,X/46,XX and 45,X/46,XY. This mosaicism can lead to a wide range of physical and developmental differences.
also from wikipedia differences, variations (disorders of ) sexual differentiation
Androgen insensitivity syndrome (AIS) – a condition which affects a genetic male's virilization. A person with androgen insensitivity syndrome produces androgens and testosterone but their body does not recognize it, either partially or completely. Mild androgen insensitivity syndrome generally causes no developmental issues and people with this form are raised as males.[44] Partial androgen insensitivity syndrome results in ambiguous genitalia and there is no consensus regarding whether to raise a child with this form as male or female. Complete androgen insensitivity syndrome causes a genetic male to have a vagina (often incompletely developed, nearly always blind-ending), breasts, and a clitoris; people with this form are raised as females.[45]
Aphallia – a rare condition where a XY male is born without a penis. As of 2017, only 100 cases have been reported in literature.[46]
Aromatase deficiency – a disorder which, in females, is characterized by androgen excess and estrogen deficiency, and can result in inappropriate virilization, though without pseudohermaphroditism (i.e., genitals are phenotypically appropriate) (with the exception of the possible incidence of clitoromegaly). Aromatase deficiency can also be caused by mutations in P450 oxidoreductase gene.[47]
Aromatase excess syndrome (familial hyperestrogenism) - a condition that causes excessive estrogen production, resulting in feminization without pseudohermaphroditism (i.e., male genitalia at birth and female secondary sexual characteristics at puberty) in males and hyperfeminization in females.[48]
Campomelic dysplasia – a condition caused by de novo autosomal dominant mutations in the SOX9 gene, causing bowing of the limbs, sex reversal in around two thirds of 46,XY males (but not in 46,XX females), and respiratory insufficiency. While in roughly 95% of cases, death occurs in the neonatal period due to respiratory distress, those that live past infancy typically survive to become adults.[49]
Clitoromegaly – a clitoris that is considered larger than average. While clitoromegaly may be a symptom of an intersex condition, it may also be considered a normal variation in clitoris size. Clitoromegaly causes no health issues. Surgical reduction of the clitoris or its complete removal may be performed to normalize the appearance of the genitalia. While female genital mutilation is outlawed in many countries, reduction or the removal of the clitoris in cases of clitoromegaly are generally exempt, despite the fact that it is a nontherapeutic and sexually damaging surgery. Clitoromegaly may also be caused by females using testosterone or anabolic steroids for purposes related to female to male gender transition or bodybuilding.
Combined 17?-hydroxylase/17,20-lyase deficiency – a condition which presents as a combination of the symptoms of congenital adrenal hyperplasia and isolated 17,20-lyase deficiency. See those two conditions for more information.[50]
Complete androgen insensitivity syndrome (CAIS) – a condition which completely affects a genetic male's ability to recognize androgens. It is considered a form of androgen insensitivity syndrome and is the most severe form. People with complete androgen insensitivity are raised as females and usually do not discover they are genetic males until they experience amenorrhoea in their late teens or they need medical intervention due to a hernia caused by their undescended testes.[51][52] Complete androgen insensitivity syndrome results in a genetic male having a vagina, clitoris, and breasts which are capable of breastfeeding. However, they will not have ovaries or a uterus. Because they do not have ovaries or sufficiently developed testicles, people with complete androgen insensitivity syndrome are infertile.[53]
Congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) – a condition that causes excessive androgen production, which causes excessive virilization. It is most problematic in genetic females, where severe virilization can result in funding [?] of labia and an enlarged clitoris.[54][55] Females with this condition are usually fertile, with the ability to become pregnant and give birth. The salt-wasting variety of this condition is fatal in infants if left untreated.[56]
Denys–Drash syndrome and the related Frasier syndrome – similar rare conditions arising from de novo autosomal dominant mutations in the WT1 gene, causing symptoms ranging from undervirilization to complete sex reversal with persistent Müllerian ducts in affected 46,XY males (but not in 46,XX females).[57] The disorders are invariably fatal before the age of 15, causing kidney failure due to nephrotic syndrome.[58]
Estrogen insensitivity syndrome (EIS) – the estrogen counterpart to androgen insensitivity syndrome. Extremely rare, with only one verified case having been reported; a biological male presented with tall stature, a heightened risk of osteoporosis, and sterility.[59]
Gartner's duct cyst – persistent Wolffian Ducts in XX females.
Gonadal dysgenesis – any congenital developmental disorder of the reproductive system characterized by a progressive loss of primordial germ cells on the developing gonads of an embryo.
Herlyn-Werner-Wunderlich syndrome – a disorder where the Müllerian ducts fail to fuse during embryonic development, leading to the presence of 2 vaginas, 2 uteruses, and a single kidney. Can also affect the spleen, bladder and other urogenital structures.[60][61]
Isolated 17,20-lyase deficiency – a condition that is characterized by either partial or complete inability to produce androgens and estrogens.[62] Results in partial or complete feminization and undervirilization in males and in a delayed, reduced, or absent puberty in both sexes, in turn causing sexual infantilism and infertility, among other symptoms.[63]
Klinefelter syndrome (47,XXY and XXY syndrome) – a condition that describes a male born with at least one extra X chromosome. Though the most common variation is 47,XXY, a man may also be 48,XXXY or 49,XXXXY. It is a common occurrence, affecting 1 in 500 to 1,000 men.[64] About 1 in 50,000 men are affected by variant 48,XXXY (Two extra X) and 1 in 100,000 men affected by variant 49,XXXXY (Three extra X).[65] While some men may have no issues related to the syndrome, some may experience gynecomastia, micropenis, cognitive difficulties, hypogonadism, reduced fertility/infertility, and/or little or no facial hair. Testosterone therapy may be pursued by men who desire a more masculine appearance and those with gynecomastia may opt to undergo a reduction mammoplasty. Men who wish to father children may be able to do so with the help of IVF.[66][4][67]
Leydig cell hypoplasia – a condition solely affecting biological males which is characterized by partial or complete inactivation of the luteinizing hormone receptor, resulting in stymied androgen production. Patients may present at birth with a fully female phenotype, ambiguous genitalia, or only mild genital defects such as micropenis and hypospadias. Upon puberty, sexual development is either impaired or fully absent.[68][69]
Lipoid congenital adrenal hyperplasia – an endocrine disorder that arises from defects in the earliest stages of steroid hormone synthesis: the transport of cholesterol into the mitochondria and the conversion of cholesterol to pregnenolone—the first step in the synthesis of all steroid hormones.[70][71]
Mild androgen insensitivity syndrome (MAIS) – a condition which mildly affects a genetic male's ability to recognize androgens. It is considered a form of androgen insensitivity syndrome and is considered the least severe form. While men generally do not need any specialized medical care related to this form, mild androgen insensitivity syndrome may result in gynecomastia and hypospadias. Neither gynecomastia nor hypospadias require surgical intervention or adversely affect a man's health though some men may opt to undergo surgery to remove their breasts and/or repair their hypospadias. Men with mild androgen insensitivity syndrome may have reduced fertility.
Mixed gonadal dysgenesis – a condition of unusual and asymmetrical gonadal development leading to an unassigned sex differentiation. A number of differences have been reported in the karyotype, most commonly a mosaicism 45,X/ 46,XY.[72]
Ovotesticular disorder (also called true hermaphroditism) – a rare condition where an individual has both ovarian and testicular tissue.[28] It is the rarest DSD with at least 500 cases being reported in literature.[73]
Partial androgen insensitivity syndrome (PAIS) – a condition which partially affects a genetic male's ability to recognize androgens. It is considered a form of androgen insensitivity syndrome and while it is not as severe as complete androgen insensitivity syndrome, it is more severe than mild androgen insensitivity syndrome.[74] Partial androgen insensitivity syndrome causes major problems with gender assignment because it causes ambiguous genitalia such as a micropenis or clitoromegaly in addition to breast development. People with partial androgen insensitivity syndrome who are assigned as males may undergo testosterone therapy to virilize their body while those who are assigned as females may undergo a surgical reduction of the clitoris and/ or estrogen therapy.[75]
Penoscrotal transposition (PST) – a group of congenital defects involving an abnormal spatial arrangement of penis and scrotum.
Persistent Müllerian duct syndrome – a condition where fallopian tubes, uterus, or the upper part of the vagina are present in an otherwise normal male.[76]
Pseudovaginal perineoscrotal hypospadias (PPSH) – a form of ambiguous genitalia which results in a phallic structure that is smaller than a penis but larger than a clitoris, a chordee, hypospadias, and a shallow vagina.[77]
Swyer syndrome (Pure Gonadal Dysgenesis or XY gonadal dysgenesis) – a type of hypogonadism in a person whose karyotype is 46,XY. The person is externally female with streak gonads, and left untreated, will not experience puberty. Such gonads are typically surgically removed (as they have a significant risk of developing tumors) and a typical medical treatment would include hormone replacement therapy with female hormones.[78][79]
Turner syndrome (Ullrich-Turner syndrome and gonadal dysgenesis) – a condition that describes a female born with only one X chromosome or with an abnormal X chromosome, making her karotype 45,X0. It occurs in 1 in 2,000 to 5,000 females.[80] Turner syndrome can cause numerous health and development problems, including but not limited to short stature, lymphedema, infertility, webbed neck, coarctation of the aorta, ADHD, amenorrhoea, and obesity.[81]
Müllerian agenesis (Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser syndrome or vaginal agenesis) – a condition that causes the uterus and other reproductive organs in a 46,XX female to be small or absent, as well as the vaginal canal itself. It affects 1 out of 4,500 to 5,000 females and can also come with skeletal or endocrine system issues at conception.[82][83]
XX testicular DSD – a condition where an individual with an XX karyotype has a male appearance. Genitalia can range from normal to ambiguous genitalia.[84] It is estimated to occur in 1 in 20,000 males.[85]
5?-reductase deficiency (5-ARD) – an autosomal recessive condition caused by a mutation of the 5-alpha reductase type 2 gene. It only affects people with Y chromosomes, namely genetic males. People with this condition are fertile, with the ability to father children, but may be raised as females due to ambiguous or feminized genitalia.[38][39]
17?-Hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase deficiency – a condition characterized by impaired androgen and estrogen synthesis in males and females, respectively. Results in pseudohermaphroditism/undervirilization in males.[40][41]
46,XX/46,XY – a chimeric condition where the person shows variable karyotype in the 23rd chromosome pair, resulting from embryonic merging.[42] It can vary in presentation from phenotypically normal, to ambiguous.[43]
Androgen insensitivity syndrome (AIS) – a condition which affects a genetic male's virilization. A person with androgen insensitivity syndrome produces androgens and testosterone but their body does not recognize it, either partially or completely. Mild androgen insensitivity syndrome generally causes no developmental issues and people with this form are raised as males.[44] Partial androgen insensitivity syndrome results in ambiguous genitalia and there is no consensus regarding whether to raise a child with this form as male or female. Complete androgen insensitivity syndrome causes a genetic male to have a vagina (often incompletely developed, nearly always blind-ending), breasts, and a clitoris; people with this form are raised as females.[45]
Aphallia – a rare condition where a XY male is born without a penis. As of 2017, only 100 cases have been reported in literature.[46]
Aromatase deficiency – a disorder which, in females, is characterized by androgen excess and estrogen deficiency, and can result in inappropriate virilization, though without pseudohermaphroditism (i.e., genitals are phenotypically appropriate) (with the exception of the possible incidence of clitoromegaly). Aromatase deficiency can also be caused by mutations in P450 oxidoreductase gene.[47]
Aromatase excess syndrome (familial hyperestrogenism) - a condition that causes excessive estrogen production, resulting in feminization without pseudohermaphroditism (i.e., male genitalia at birth and female secondary sexual characteristics at puberty) in males and hyperfeminization in females.[48]
Campomelic dysplasia – a condition caused by de novo autosomal dominant mutations in the SOX9 gene, causing bowing of the limbs, sex reversal in around two thirds of 46,XY males (but not in 46,XX females), and respiratory insufficiency. While in roughly 95% of cases, death occurs in the neonatal period due to respiratory distress, those that live past infancy typically survive to become adults.[49]
Clitoromegaly – a clitoris that is considered larger than average. While clitoromegaly may be a symptom of an intersex condition, it may also be considered a normal variation in clitoris size. Clitoromegaly causes no health issues. Surgical reduction of the clitoris or its complete removal may be performed to normalize the appearance of the genitalia. While female genital mutilation is outlawed in many countries, reduction or the removal of the clitoris in cases of clitoromegaly are generally exempt, despite the fact that it is a nontherapeutic and sexually damaging surgery. Clitoromegaly may also be caused by females using testosterone or anabolic steroids for purposes related to female to male gender transition or bodybuilding.
Combined 17?-hydroxylase/17,20-lyase deficiency – a condition which presents as a combination of the symptoms of congenital adrenal hyperplasia and isolated 17,20-lyase deficiency. See those two conditions for more information.[50]
Complete androgen insensitivity syndrome (CAIS) – a condition which completely affects a genetic male's ability to recognize androgens. It is considered a form of androgen insensitivity syndrome and is the most severe form. People with complete androgen insensitivity are raised as females and usually do not discover they are genetic males until they experience amenorrhoea in their late teens or they need medical intervention due to a hernia caused by their undescended testes.[51][52] Complete androgen insensitivity syndrome results in a genetic male having a vagina, clitoris, and breasts which are capable of breastfeeding. However, they will not have ovaries or a uterus. Because they do not have ovaries or sufficiently developed testicles, people with complete androgen insensitivity syndrome are infertile.[53]
Congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) – a condition that causes excessive androgen production, which causes excessive virilization. It is most problematic in genetic females, where severe virilization can result in funding [?] of labia and an enlarged clitoris.[54][55] Females with this condition are usually fertile, with the ability to become pregnant and give birth. The salt-wasting variety of this condition is fatal in infants if left untreated.[56]
Denys–Drash syndrome and the related Frasier syndrome – similar rare conditions arising from de novo autosomal dominant mutations in the WT1 gene, causing symptoms ranging from undervirilization to complete sex reversal with persistent Müllerian ducts in affected 46,XY males (but not in 46,XX females).[57] The disorders are invariably fatal before the age of 15, causing kidney failure due to nephrotic syndrome.[58]
Estrogen insensitivity syndrome (EIS) – the estrogen counterpart to androgen insensitivity syndrome. Extremely rare, with only one verified case having been reported; a biological male presented with tall stature, a heightened risk of osteoporosis, and sterility.[59]
Gartner's duct cyst – persistent Wolffian Ducts in XX females.
Gonadal dysgenesis – any congenital developmental disorder of the reproductive system characterized by a progressive loss of primordial germ cells on the developing gonads of an embryo.
Herlyn-Werner-Wunderlich syndrome – a disorder where the Müllerian ducts fail to fuse during embryonic development, leading to the presence of 2 vaginas, 2 uteruses, and a single kidney. Can also affect the spleen, bladder and other urogenital structures.[60][61]
Isolated 17,20-lyase deficiency – a condition that is characterized by either partial or complete inability to produce androgens and estrogens.[62] Results in partial or complete feminization and undervirilization in males and in a delayed, reduced, or absent puberty in both sexes, in turn causing sexual infantilism and infertility, among other symptoms.[63]
Klinefelter syndrome (47,XXY and XXY syndrome) – a condition that describes a male born with at least one extra X chromosome. Though the most common variation is 47,XXY, a man may also be 48,XXXY or 49,XXXXY. It is a common occurrence, affecting 1 in 500 to 1,000 men.[64] About 1 in 50,000 men are affected by variant 48,XXXY (Two extra X) and 1 in 100,000 men affected by variant 49,XXXXY (Three extra X).[65] While some men may have no issues related to the syndrome, some may experience gynecomastia, micropenis, cognitive difficulties, hypogonadism, reduced fertility/infertility, and/or little or no facial hair. Testosterone therapy may be pursued by men who desire a more masculine appearance and those with gynecomastia may opt to undergo a reduction mammoplasty. Men who wish to father children may be able to do so with the help of IVF.[66][4][67]
Leydig cell hypoplasia – a condition solely affecting biological males which is characterized by partial or complete inactivation of the luteinizing hormone receptor, resulting in stymied androgen production. Patients may present at birth with a fully female phenotype, ambiguous genitalia, or only mild genital defects such as micropenis and hypospadias. Upon puberty, sexual development is either impaired or fully absent.[68][69]
Lipoid congenital adrenal hyperplasia – an endocrine disorder that arises from defects in the earliest stages of steroid hormone synthesis: the transport of cholesterol into the mitochondria and the conversion of cholesterol to pregnenolone—the first step in the synthesis of all steroid hormones.[70][71]
Mild androgen insensitivity syndrome (MAIS) – a condition which mildly affects a genetic male's ability to recognize androgens. It is considered a form of androgen insensitivity syndrome and is considered the least severe form. While men generally do not need any specialized medical care related to this form, mild androgen insensitivity syndrome may result in gynecomastia and hypospadias. Neither gynecomastia nor hypospadias require surgical intervention or adversely affect a man's health though some men may opt to undergo surgery to remove their breasts and/or repair their hypospadias. Men with mild androgen insensitivity syndrome may have reduced fertility.
Mixed gonadal dysgenesis – a condition of unusual and asymmetrical gonadal development leading to an unassigned sex differentiation. A number of differences have been reported in the karyotype, most commonly a mosaicism 45,X/ 46,XY.[72]
Ovotesticular disorder (also called true hermaphroditism) – a rare condition where an individual has both ovarian and testicular tissue.[28] It is the rarest DSD with at least 500 cases being reported in literature.[73]
Partial androgen insensitivity syndrome (PAIS) – a condition which partially affects a genetic male's ability to recognize androgens. It is considered a form of androgen insensitivity syndrome and while it is not as severe as complete androgen insensitivity syndrome, it is more severe than mild androgen insensitivity syndrome.[74] Partial androgen insensitivity syndrome causes major problems with gender assignment because it causes ambiguous genitalia such as a micropenis or clitoromegaly in addition to breast development. People with partial androgen insensitivity syndrome who are assigned as males may undergo testosterone therapy to virilize their body while those who are assigned as females may undergo a surgical reduction of the clitoris and/ or estrogen therapy.[75]
Penoscrotal transposition (PST) – a group of congenital defects involving an abnormal spatial arrangement of penis and scrotum.
Persistent Müllerian duct syndrome – a condition where fallopian tubes, uterus, or the upper part of the vagina are present in an otherwise normal male.[76]
Pseudovaginal perineoscrotal hypospadias (PPSH) – a form of ambiguous genitalia which results in a phallic structure that is smaller than a penis but larger than a clitoris, a chordee, hypospadias, and a shallow vagina.[77]
Swyer syndrome (Pure Gonadal Dysgenesis or XY gonadal dysgenesis) – a type of hypogonadism in a person whose karyotype is 46,XY. The person is externally female with streak gonads, and left untreated, will not experience puberty. Such gonads are typically surgically removed (as they have a significant risk of developing tumors) and a typical medical treatment would include hormone replacement therapy with female hormones.[78][79]
Turner syndrome (Ullrich-Turner syndrome and gonadal dysgenesis) – a condition that describes a female born with only one X chromosome or with an abnormal X chromosome, making her karotype 45,X0. It occurs in 1 in 2,000 to 5,000 females.[80] Turner syndrome can cause numerous health and development problems, including but not limited to short stature, lymphedema, infertility, webbed neck, coarctation of the aorta, ADHD, amenorrhoea, and obesity.[81]
Müllerian agenesis (Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser syndrome or vaginal agenesis) – a condition that causes the uterus and other reproductive organs in a 46,XX female to be small or absent, as well as the vaginal canal itself. It affects 1 out of 4,500 to 5,000 females and can also come with skeletal or endocrine system issues at conception.[82][83]
XX testicular DSD – a condition where an individual with an XX karyotype has a male appearance. Genitalia can range from normal to ambiguous genitalia.[84] It is estimated to occur in 1 in 20,000 males.[85]
Of course, one can just categorically state there are only two biological sexes and try to force everyone into one of their two categories, but nature and biology provide us with a lot of examples to the contrary and despite their wish to simplify the matter to suit their preference, it is just not factual or true.
Gender is a subject different from the biology of sexual differentiation, as is the subject of trans or gender dysphoria. The debate about bathrooms, locker rooms and sports teams is also separate from the biology of these matters. None of these are easy subjects with simple answers. Lets's just put doors on all the stalls, changing rooms in all the locker rooms and decide about sports on a case by case basis. Only about 14 reported trans athletes in the entire NCAA programs. Increasingly to some facts and science don't matter but hopefully in philosophy at least some degree of logic applies.
Yeah, what did I think making that post? It's never been the facts that are at issue.
Quoting AmadeusD
Which I don't think I do:
Quoting AmadeusD
And that's, I think, where the disjunct is: We're likely not agreeing who counts as "weirdo". I really don't think I should have made the post. I simply don't have the stamina to suss this out. Certainly not now. I'm tired.
The point is that they think that they are a type of man. I have been asking you what type of man do they think they are? You might say trans-man, but what does that mean? How is a trans-man different than a biological one - specifically. We keep going in circles because you fail to provide a specific example of what it means to be a sociological-man or psychological-man (even though psychology is rooted in biology), as opposed to a biological man.
Quoting Michael
I'm not suggesting anything. I am taking your own suggestions as if they are true and trying to reconcile them because they are contradictory.
Sure, children can form a concept that gender is based solely on what one wears and the pronouns that are used to refer to others, but then they would only be getting part of the story. This would be like a child hearing a curse word and then using it without a full understanding of how and when it should be used.
Why do some people wear dresses and why do some wear pants? Children are curious (I'll show you mine if you show me yours). They will eventually figure it out.
Quoting MichaelYou're the one denying something from entering a bathroom based on whether that something is artificial or not.
A transgender man believes that his sex is female and his gender is male.
A transgender woman believes that her sex is male and her gender is female.
Quoting from WHO:
Sex "refers to the different biological and physiological characteristics of females, males and intersex persons, such as chromosomes, hormones and reproductive organs."
Gender "refers to the characteristics of women, men, girls and boys that are socially constructed. This includes norms, behaviours and roles associated with being a woman, man, girl or boy, as well as relationships with each other. As a social construct, gender varies from society to society and can change over time."
Quoting Harry Hindu
And children identify as belonging to one gender or another at this very young age, most often before they have any understanding of biological sex. Once this gender identity is established it is mostly irreversible.
Quoting Harry Hindu
No I'm not.
You are the one who claimed that one's sex parts determine which bathroom one should be allowed to use.
I don't know why you continue to avoid answering the question.
Should transgender men who have had genital surgery use the men's bathroom or the women's bathroom?
You have two very simple answers to choose from, so just choose. Stop with the tiresome deflection.
Which is to say that gender as a social construction is sexism. Which also means that to change gender, or to be gender fluid, would mean you would need to travel to different cultures or through time.
Quoting Michael
How do they identify with one gender or another when gender is a social construction? Wouldn't it be society that determines their gender?
Quoting Michael
Talk about hypocrisy. I'm not deflecting. You are as well as cherry-picking. If gender is a social construction them having genital surgery has nothing to do with gender. You keep conflating the two. Using one particular bathroom or the other does not affirm one's gender, so I don' know why you keep bringing up genital surgery in a thread about gender as a social, sexist construct.
I'm bringing it up because you object to transgender men using the men's bathroom and transgender women using the women's bathroom.
I'm bringing it up because you claimed that one's sex parts determine which bathroom one should use.
So just answer the question.
Should transgender men who have had genital surgery use the men's bathroom or the women's bathroom?
Your continued unwillingness to provide an answer is incredibly telling.
Quoting Harry Hindu
This is like asking how can we learn a language when language is a social construction. It's just something the human brain and mind does. The specifics of how and why the human brain and mind does what it does is a very complicated question that neuroscientists and psychologists are still trying to answer.
The reality is – despite your objections (and your conspiratorial accusation that this is some left-wing political fabrication?) – is that a) gender exists, that b) gender is distinct from sex, that c) people can and do identify as belonging to a gender that is atypical of their sex, and that d) this gender identity is an integral aspect of one's psyche that developed and became fixed at a very young age.
No, it's not.
Quoting Michael
Yes, because bathrooms are divided by sex and not gender.
It's really that simple. It is you that is conflating gender as a social construction and sex by asking about bathrooms.
I have already pointed out that women use the men's bathroom in certain circumstances and men using the women's bathroom in certain circumstances, so it doesn't matter which one someone uses, as long as they don't believe that using one or the other is affirming anything other than humans need to take a piss and shit from time to time. Just as wearing long hair and earrings isn't affirming a gender either because both sexes can wear either, or both, and it has no bearing on their gender or sex.
Your bathroom argument is like you keep asking if it's okay for a man to have long hair and earrings. Sure it is, but doing so does not affirm their gender since both women and men wear earrings and have long hair. It's a red herring.
Why?
I asked you this before and you said "because it's where we uncover our sex parts".
So how do you account for those who have had genital surgery? Should transgender men who have had genital surgery continue to use the women's bathroom – because their sex is female – or should they use the men's bathroom – because their sex parts, even though artificial, are like those of biological men?
Quoting Harry Hindu
No, it's not. That's why we have such terms as "gender non-conforming". This obviously doesn't mean "sex non-conforming" because what does it mean to be sex non-conforming? Does it mean to act as if one has an XX karyotype (even though one doesn't)? Does it mean to act as if one has ovaries (even though one doesn't)?
Gender exists, and it is distinct from sex, and people identify as belonging to a gender that is atypical of their sex. This is the reality that you need to accept.
I also said that women have used the men's bathroom and men have used the women's bathroom, but you keep cherry-picking. So generally speaking, bathrooms are divided by sex and using one bathroom or the other does not affirm one's gender. It doesn't even affirm one's sex. Social constructions do not affirm anything other than that you live in a particular culture.
Using one bathroom or another is a social construction. A social construction based on one's sex, not gender. The way you speak of gender as a social construction means that gender would be a society's expectations of the sexes - that they use the appropriate bathroom based on their sex. So the social construction states that males use the men's bathroom and females use the women's bathroom. The rules are only enforced when someone enters the other bathroom for reasons other than to simply piss or shit.
Quoting Michael
What are they not conforming to if not the social construction? It is their feeling, or psychology that is not conforming to the social construction, and it is the social construction that you are defining as gender, not their personal feeling that is the anti-thesis of the what is accepted socially.
So should the transgender man who has had genital surgery continue to use the women's bathroom because his sex is female?
Or should the transgender man who has had genital surgery use the men's bathroom because he has a surgically-constructed phallus?
Will you ever just answer the question?
Quoting Harry Hindu
This isn't difficult Harry.
Gender identity is to gender as being a Christian is to Christianity.
And just as nobody gets to dictate which religion you belong to (even though they may try), nobody gets to dictate which gender you belong to.
Instead of going round in a loop of disagreement I think it would be useful to get your understanding of why you think society and (most) women object to trans women in female spaces. Also, what constitutes being a woman?
Is it incumbent on everyone else to fall into line with someone’s view of who they are?
Quoting Harry Hindu
Quoting Harry Hindu
First, a toilet doesn't care if you have one sex organ. . . the other. . . or both so the discussion or back and forth your having with @Michael sort of ends there as regards your sex organs being the SOLE determinant of which bathroom you go into.
Second, you say we should just advocate for gender neutrality as if that is so simple a goal to obtain nor question whether it is in fact obtainable at all. Especially since the simplest examples of choosing what clothes you wear doesn't exhaust the greater depth of ascribed gender differences from mannerisms, voice inflection, word choice, social groups, personal interests, etc. To be 'gender neutral' would be to completely annihilate any statistically significant sex differences across the bulk of these aspects across our society to the point that any differences can be seen as mere random fluctuation.
I can't say any of that would be successful or that higher level meta-gender roles would arise regardless more out of biologically pernicious psychological faculties which couldn't be reasoned away or culturally ironed out.
In fact, it dooms any sense of ideological groupings not based on random assignments of biological characteristics to be thrown into the flames. A women is someone who has these characteristics but does that then imply anything about you being a feminist because you happen to have the same characteristics? Biological categories can be too coarse a categorization or classification scheme to actually capture real group mentalities. It therefore makes any group unification and motivation rather a taxing or difficult affair as. . . what is it that is supposed to actually band them together at all besides merely listing a series of irrelevant biological traits they have in common?
This is the feminist trap as those who advocate for groups as such to be banded underneath have to have a particular ideological motivation beyond the bare commonalities. Otherwise it dooms it to contrivance and irrelevancy.
This would extend far beyond the bathroom issue to all aspects of society in general.
In the opposite direction, motivating for such a high focus on any such biological features and their resultant 'effects' later in development from deterministic or statistical viewpoint is just asking for stereotypes to be born. New gender roles and new social splits to be made. Whether positive, negative, neutral or otherwise.
You can only do so much in getting rid of the 'irrelevant gender roles' until biological necessity, determinism, and essentialism bite you in the back as regards stubborn statistically significant differences which can never fully be 'dispersed' with.
I'm sure there are many reasons, just as I'm sure there are many reasons why most men in the UK object to trans men using the men's bathroom.
A better question to ask is; are there any good reasons to object to trans men using men's spaces and trans women using women's spaces? When it comes to something like sports, I think there are. But when it comes to something like toilets? I've already addressed the fact that if safety is our main concern then it's better to let trans men use the men's bathroom and trans women using the women's bathroom.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
Either having a female sex or having a female gender.
Having a female sex refers to having been born with some combination of an XX karyotype, ova-producing ovaries, a womb, breasts, and a vagina (admitting of the existence of intersex people that sometimes make such a classification tricky).
Having a female gender refers to identifying as belonging to the social and cultural group that is typically occupied by those with a female sex, and often feeling most comfortable in expressing oneself in a manner mostly consistent with this social and cultural group.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
If you want to be a decent person, then yes. Otherwise you're just an ass.
I already did but you've been cherry-picking.
According to your definition of gender as a social construct, gender would be the agreement among members of a society that females use the women's bathroom and males use the men's bathroom. In other words, gender is an expectation, or an agreement, that the sexes, not gender, behave in a certain way. Gender would be the agreement - the social construct, and sex - the biological construct. So, I'm not sure that you really understand what a social construction is. To conflate the social construct with the biological construct would be sexism.
Which bathroom should a woman that had a double-mastectomy from cancer use? Did her sex change because she had a double mastectomy? Does having a double mastectomy change one's gender (society's expectation about which bathroom she uses)? No, so she uses the women's bathroom, but she can use the men's bathroom in certain situations, like when there is a long line at the women's bathroom or to assist her elderly father.
Quoting Michael
Isn't this what I said before in equating trans-genderism to a delusion. Both trans-genderism and Christianity are forms of mass-delusion. So nice of you to finally get the point.
Yet you have described me in terms that I do not identify and I doubt that Malcolm identifies as an ass. Hypocrite.
You're being too cavalier with your use of the term "delusion". Those who believe in Christianity do not suffer from a psychosis.
And you appear to have missed the point. I am not saying that gender is a belief-system like Christianity. I am providing an example of what it means to identify as belonging to a social construct because you seem to have so much difficulty understanding this.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Should the transgender man who has had genital surgery continue to use the women's bathroom?
The question was answered. Did having genital surgery change their sex? I asked the same question in my example of a woman with a double mastectomy.
Quoting Michael
It was your (poor) choice to use Christianity as an example.
And I said that to identify as a social construct is sexist.
No it hasn't.
I want a "yes" or a "no", not a deflection.
Should the transgender man who has had genital surgery continue to use the women's bathroom?
Quoting Harry Hindu
No it's not. It's just a psychological reality.
If the social construct states that bathrooms are generally divided by sex, then you use the bathroom that corresponds with your sex. To identify as the social construct is sexism. The bathroom does not affirm your sex. It only affirms you agree with the social construction.
So you are saying that a transgender man who has had genital surgery should continue to use the women's bathroom because his sex is female? Even though he has a surgically-constructed phallus?
That's what I've been asking. Does having genital, or a double mastectomy surgery change your sex, or your gender? Yes, or no?
You tell me. You're the one demanding that bathrooms be separated by sex. Is the transgender man who has had genital surgery a biological woman? Should he continue to use the women's bathroom?
So you are saying that a transgender man who has had genital surgery should continue to the use the women's bathroom?
I've noticed there's some disconnect between the two arguments here.
So, what is your argument in one sentence. Or two. One as simple as possible, and one as thorough as possible.
From what I can tell, as it stands at the moment of writing, the disconnect or disagreement is as follows:
@Michael believes a "transgender man" is a proper title that accurately describes a human being who wishes to identify as a gender that he was not born as. Whether this is a will, whim, or some deep longing and extreme existential desire that we are horrible people for preventing, he has yet to answer.
You believe, no, wishing you were someone else (be they a different gender, race, wealth class, or what have you) is simply a wish and not part of reality. Nor is it a medical need or necessity that requires a "remedy".
Do you agree with that, or no? If not, why not? Please be specific.
So you don’t think there any good reasons to restrict access to female facilities to females only.
I
Michael has defined gender is a social construct.
A social construct is defined as an agreement between members of a society.
Gender as a social construct would be the agreement between members of a society on how each sex behaves.
To identify as a one gender or the other would be identifying as an expectation society has of the sexes.
How is an expectation, or agreement among members of a society, an identity?
The expectation is not that using one bathroom or the other makes you, or affirms, you are a woman or a man. It is based on an understanding there are these biological realities of male and female a priori to the social construction and it is the social construction that is dependent upon these biological realities to exist.
Society is not saying that wearing a dress makes you a woman. Society is saying that you are a female and we expect you to behave this way because you are a female.
So females have to accommodate women in female only spaces? Even if that makes them uncomfortable and fearful?
I addressed that earlier:
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_identity
Not necessarily. Fear of a prolonged electricity outage could be considered a social construct, a wholly modern invention, while it is certainly not an "agreement" between anyone. It's outright undesired. But the intrinsic nature of losing something one desires, no matter how foolish and unnecessary, makes it widespread and common. Begrudgingly acknowledging what we do not wish to acknowledge is an agreement, but denial remains a true factor in society which invalidates any sort of conscious or willful agreement.
Quoting Harry Hindu
This is where it gets weird. Fuzzy, if you will. I'll continue to your next sentence as to "expectation."
Quoting Harry Hindu
Expectation is fine. No one is forced to behave a certain way other than the basic codified laws. Don't murder people, don't park at Zone A after 6PM, etc., etc. ad infinitum.
Sure, people don't expect you to walk around in public cursing and grabbing one's genitals in front of mixed company, but legally, that's allowed. One might be socially ostracized, but as long as no codified law is broken (harassing, stalking, or assaulting said person) that's just nobodies concern.
To the point, an identity is what one holds as a fundamental core of their existence. For example, one might consider oneself a lover, another might consider themself a fighter, or an intellect, or a "blunt" person. That's their right (in most all countries) to pursue what they consider happiness, be it fulfilling or not, provided it doesn't break codified laws.
Parents often expect their children to be "good persons", and such might be considered one's identity. Don't you consider yourself a good person? That's one aspect of your identity sure. But, as I'm sure you agree, that doesn't cast an unchangeable mold as to who or what you are (or perhaps can be). Does it?
Quoting Harry Hindu
This is what I would consider the key point of your argument. While I agree, surely plenty don't. And though I feel you've answered this quite succinctly, surely @Michael will address this quote specifically.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Society can say whatever it wants. I mean, sure, in theory, society can pass a law saying people under 5' should be killed for their own well-being, or perhaps that certain people should be enslaved. It doesn't make it right. Naturally, one must adapt to survive. So even in unjust times and scenarios, one would be wise to, I suppose, "get with the program" and do what you must do to survive. This has been the one consistent reality since the beginning of time. But, that doesn't change the underlying deeper reality that just because something is how it is, doesn't mean it's how it should be or would be best for all. You can agree on that much, yes?
In short, social expectations don't conflate with modern legal systems that separate persons by sex during moments of vulnerability (using the bathroom, being seated for a prolonged period with one's pants down and around their ankles thus immobilizing the person). Men have a primal desire to mate (engage in intercourse) with women. Anyone who avoids that fact is simply ignorant of the larger discussion. And human persons born a male are liable to retain such desires regardless of artificial medical operation. Am I wrong?
And I'm tired of you refusing to answer the question.
You claim that one's sex parts dictate which bathroom one should use. So how does your rule account for those who have had genital surgery?
Should the transgender man who has had genital surgery continue to use the women's bathroom?
This only requires a single word response: either "yes" or "no". Why is it so difficult for you?
Provide a citation that defines a social construction as such. What you described could just as easily be categorized a delusion. Fear of the government and conspiracy theories would qualify as social constructs using this weird example of yours. What makes the construct a social one, if not an agreement between a (vast) majority of the members of a society?
If gender is not a social construct in the sense that society is saying, "you are a female so use the women's restroom" then why are trans-people trying to modify their biology in an effort to conform with the expectation?
Quoting Outlander
Which is to say that using one bathroom or the other, or dressing one way or the other, does not affirm anything.
Sexual behaviors are limited to a particular scope based on one's physical characteristics. Men inseminate women and women bear children. Women breast-feed their children and menstruate. Men can urinate standing up without getting piss all over their legs and pants. That's pretty much it. Anything else would be a category error.
I'm sure if you went and asked these XX chromosome 'people' that they would have a lot to say about who they are and what they mentally take part in. You will find features statistically significant and present in splitting among male or female individuals. You will also find that groups of the same individuals of the same sex will create groups of their own.
People NEED a word and a CONCEPT that is meant to refer to the emergent behavior of creating groups or of group involvement out of individuals. Culture and society allow for not only the emergence of said groups but also the criteria, implicit or explicit, that many will use in assessing acceptance into said camps.
If you advocate for biologically objective features. . . then you also have to contend with the emergence of biologically split groupings and social/cultural classes. Whether you like it or not. Then. . . it only takes time for someone to ask whether they do in fact bend to meet enough of those criteria by virtue of what features they do possess.
If gender is to be dispensed with. . . then so do woman's groups because why are they meant to 'ban' together and under what core principles? That they merely have the same sex organs so they need to join the cause and there is no other reasons to do so?
Quoting Harry Hindu Ergo. . . there are fundamental biological categories and this inevitably will lead to different social roles or cultural significance.
So when you indicate that transgenderism would just vanish if we just abandoned the notion of gender, period. Your literal biological determinism requires such distinctions continue to exist by DNA and statistically significant means.
If those fundamental biological roles and their accompanying life changes persist
. . . then so will some semblance of their social roles. . .
. . . which will also permeate our culture.
Quoting Harry Hindu Why does anyone attempt to mirror those around them? Desire for group involvement? Personal sense of self image acceptance?
People have been slowly growing in the ability and desire to modify their bodies to fit their own senses of self-image acceptance for a while now.
No, it isn't. You're conflating human's social nature with their sexual nature.
Quoting substantivalism
Right, which is to say that the group's membership is dependent upon one's sex, no different than saying that bathrooms are dependent upon one's sex. I am not saying that being a member of a group of all women makes you a woman, or that using the Women's bathroom makes you a woman. I am saying that being a woman or man is a biological reality and our cultural expectations are dependent upon this biological reality. It's not, "I am a woman because I use the Women's restroom". It is "I use the Women's bathroom because I am a woman". Do you see the difference? The expectation follows the biological reality, not the other way around because that would be sexist. The reality of being a woman or a man is not dependent upon which bathroom one uses, as I have already shown that men and women use each other's bathrooms in certain situations, and all of these situations are extraneous to affirming one's sex or gender.
Quoting substantivalism
Sure, and every culture is different, which means that the social and cultural roles are dependent upon those biological realities. It does not shape those biological realties. Dependency is a type of relationship between two separate things where one depends on the a priori existence of the other - meaning you wouldn't have expectations of sex or gender if there was no such thing as sex and gender.
Quoting substantivalism
What are they attempting to mirror, another's sex or gender?
Quoting substantivalism
Ok, so is wearing a nose-ring or having a tattoo an expression of one's gender or sex? What identity are they expressing by getting a nose-ring or a tattoo? Am I suppose to refer to someone differently because they have a nose-ring or tattoo?
Quoting Harry Hindu Note, however, that we have created bathrooms which do not in fact depend on what sex you are and accommodate families, those with disabilities, larger statures, or intersex people. Further, the porcelain throne here does not in fact discriminate on any of that.
Do you want to know what I saw in the bathroom of my sex at the park yesterday? A single toilet and no urinal. . . because that is all that is needed even for us with sharp shooters. So if we are talking ability and biological ease then there is nothing much more or less needed for someone to do their business. Aside from a changing station for families, a tampon dispenser as was present at all mixed sex use bathrooms at my university, or a larger stall with bars to assist individuals.
Quoting Harry Hindu As am I. . . but some of those features are more mutable than others which at present could be considered immutable. While a certain selection of even those malleable features generate normative disagreement or unrest to having them changed regardless of the reason. I.E. your complaints a while ago about people 'removing' their sex organs to be replaced by others.
So. . . yes. . . but:
1) Some or even most biological features at this point are extremely malleable in light of current technology, cultural acceptance, trends, or personal choice.
2) Only really a subset of those malleable traits are considered to possess some sense of desirable, normative, or appropriate appeal which people have voiced objections on considering them as such.
Quoting Harry Hindu Exactly. . . so we didn't pull the vague family resemblance terms 'woman' or 'man' in common practice/language from our a*%.
However, that still doesn't in fact answer which of those and in what sense or manner are to be considered normative or appropriate. Saying, "I'll just be gender neutral on it." Sort of skirts the entire complex issue here and ignores from a fence sitting standpoint that most individuals in society at large will choose just those same traits/stereotypes to exhibit because they have the freedom to do so. It may even arise rather naturally in a statistical sense so what are you supposed to do now to achieve your gender neutrality project?
It seems your desire for personal freedom of choice, biological objectivity, and desire for gender neutrality seem to all conflict with each other.
Quoting Harry Hindu Both. . . because you already agree to and so do I that they are extremely intertwined. Everything is biology. . . so a lot is on the table for one to want to mimic or modify.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Yes.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Quoting Harry Hindu Why would they wear a nose ring and thereby socially flaunt it? You can ask them you know.
You could point it out and say, "Wow! That is an interesting nose ring you got there." Maybe this person will continue the conversation or they don't. . . that is the complexity of interacting with. . . people. You could shut your mouth and never do anything as regards it which is what they want. . . or don't want. Social interactions can be rolling the dice sometimes in trying to infer the inner private desires of an individual. You won't know until you open your mouth or act differently to indicate as such.
It also could serve as a social cue but again for what reason could be unknown and is really only known to that person. You can still play the social game of trying to infer what it is. What are you afraid of snowflake? I'm sure you and most people do this all the time even implicitly.
____________________________________________________________________________
Even though some or all features are biological in origin does not really answer whether we should be neutral or un-neutral on ANY OF THEM as regards their normative status.
We typically don't have to because the other more obvious male and female sexual characteristics occur almost always with the male and female chromosomes.
Mating is a type of "social business" and in a culture where our bodies are covered with clothing, we have agreed that females and males dress in distinct ways to be able to find an appropriate mate in a way that allows us to express our sexual orientation. Is a man that has sex with a woman that thinks she's a man gay or straight?
Quoting substantivalism
Sure, the toilet is the catch-all. But for men, using a urinal is typically more efficient (it takes less time). If it didn't then why were urinals invented in the first place?
Quoting substantivalism
Sure, but the question is, does changing those features actually make you what you claim to identify as?
Did this man's modifications make him a tiger?
Is a hole between a man's legs, that he has to use medical grade stents to keep it from closing, a vagina?
Quoting substantivalism
But that is what the trans-community is saying - that identifying as a man or a woman can come at a whim and is fluid - that a woman is a woman simply by deciding to be one.
Quoting substantivalism
They don't. You can dress as you want, but that doesn't mean you can tell me what I can or can't say. Your freedom to do as you choose stops when it limits the choices that others have. Only an authoritarian would disagree.
It is sexist and racist to put people in socially constructed boxes based on their sex and race when one's sexual and racial characteristics are not naturally connected to the socially constructed characteristics, but are arbitrarily connected.
Quoting substantivalism
Why not just be yourself - the person you were born to be? It was naturally determined that you are either male or female. Isn't wisdom understanding the difference between the things you can change and the things you can't?
Quoting substantivalism
Really, which gender or sex is one expressing by getting a nose-ring or tattoo? I don't have either, so which gender or sex does that make me?
Quoting RogueAI
What does that even mean, "fully transitioned?" Did they have their chromosomes changed?
A biological woman who looks very much like a man. Has had sex change operation, double mastectomy, hormone treatment, etc. What restroom do you want her to use?
Are you obsessed on a daily basis with assessing is the person I'm talking to really XX/XY chromosome or are they faking it? If you say yes you are sexist. . . literally.
Quoting Harry Hindu It's actually therefore inefficient if a toilet can support multiple roles and most bathrooms I've gone into that are only for one sex. . . single person. . . only have had that in numerous businesses.
What about a toilet removes efficiency? Left up the lid and suddenly its a urinal.
With it is the increased sense of privacy that I do value.
Quoting Harry Hindu Identify as what? We. . . as in the person you are chatting with which isn't a strawman. . .
Quoting Harry Hindu
Quoting Harry Hindu Yes they can. . . they get to tell you how they want themselves to be referred as. . . or talked to. Why do you think we ask people what THEIR name is and don't just make something up on the spot?
Basic Human communication demands this as such.
Quoting Harry Hindu Are you trying to respond to something I said? Or is this just more irrelevant rapid rambling on your part.
Quoting Harry Hindu . . . except those 'socially constructed boxes' arose from Human beings. . . who talk, move, or interact because of the bodies and minds they have. . . which are a result of their biology. . .
It's all biology remember. It's all natural.
What is 'not natural' or 'arbitrary'?
I think you seem to not understand that if something is mutable or 'socially constructed' and that one has the freedom to entertain it or not that all of sudden there shouldn't be any normative guidelines. That statistical patterns won't emerge or that there will be strong cultural preferences that even the freedom loving populace will still prefer to entertain.
Quoting Harry Hindu Wisdom also recognizes we need generalized categories or universals to designate characteristics and compare ourselves to others. Otherwise you wouldn't know what words or concepts to designate who you are. . . if you didn't contrast yourself with others.
It's just a useless tautology that I'd expect to see in a hippie circle. "We are people that people." It dulls the distinctions to a point that you can't even talk about what it is you are talking about or exemplify to others how you feel because you refuse to create generalized categories/comparisons.
You can still be who are born as AND adopt the language of the time or concepts there in to attempt to exemplify in a successful. . . or unsuccessful fashion. . . the qualia you have.
Adopting the biological characteristics of others is just another step in the same direction. We have been modifying our bodies for centuries. In fact, literally working out is doing just that as its putting your body through stress to achieve a physique associated with attractiveness as well as practical utility.
Quoting Harry Hindu I guess you will have to do some research into how our current culture generally views the possession of said garments or ask the person in question why they in fact wear it at all.
Not one contributor has addressed what it means to be a woman in 2025.
Biology is fundamental to a woman’s experience and existence. Not because of genitalia or menstruation or even physical disadvantages but how they are perceived by society. That is gender. How society looks at women. What it is to be a woman is built by society from the day a girl is born. How a woman is viewed and views herself is built minute by minute by society. Luckily, in 2025 most of society is fairly relaxed and doesn’t discriminate and laws have been put in place to prevent discrimination but there is still a fundamental difference between men and women.
In sports, excluding men is based on biology. I doubt anyone can argue against that now. Women’s spaces are based on biology because of how society looks at women and the social norms regarding ablutions and public nakedness.
There is a difference between men’s and women’s exclusive places because there is no cultural issue with men sharing spaces with trans men.
Has anyone of the "let all facilities be unisex" asked women what they think of that? Society's preferences seem to be sacrificed on the altar of making sure every minority view is included.
Some very contorted views on here trying to justify males encroaching on female spaces.
Quoting substantivalism
No. I'm merely pointing out that there are cases where it is important to know what sex someone is (mating and medical contexts), and you seem to think that knowing another's sex is never relevant in any context. Answer this question: A woman masquerading as a man walks into a gay bar and fools a gay man into believing they are a man. Is that unethical?
Quoting substantivalism
I don't know. Why were urinals invented? I did ask that and you did not answer. Why are hands-free toilet flushing, sinks, soap dispensers and air dryers were invented - to limit the spread of germs. If you like touching a public toilet seat to lift it up, that is your prerogative, but something tells me that you were one of those people that insisted everyone get a vaccine and wear a mask during Covid, sooo....
Quoting substantivalism
Does modifying your body make you the think you are trying to emulate? Does having a "sex-changing" operation make you the opposite sex? Is a hole between a man's legs, that he has to use medical grade stents to keep it from closing, a vagina? Yes, or no?
Quoting substantivalism
Not when they way they want me to speak does not reflect my own views, it reflects theirs. My view is that men and women are adult human males and females, not some psychological or social construct. We are free to disagree and go our separate ways. Neither has to submit to the will of the other. The problem is that delusional people always seek to affirm their delusions by trying to force others into participating in their delusion and will appear offended when others refuse to participate.
Quoting substantivalism
Exactly my point in that "woman" and "man" need to be used consistently and not have open-ended meanings so that we know how to use the terms to refer to ourselves. You said that having a nose-ring and tattoos is an expression of one's sex/gender. I asked which sex/gender does having a nose-ring and tattoos make me? You didn't answer. You don't answer a lot of pertinent questions.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
I'm pretty sure I defined a woman as an adult human female somewhere in this thread.
I think we are probably on the same page. You’ve just gone down rabbit holes of madness arguing minutiae with some of the more esoteric posters.
Adult human female is a definition I’ll agree with.
Genitalia (presumably the underlying biological reality and innate chemical differences that produce the difference types) and menstruation is gender? Menstruation is a social construct? Really? Like women can just will the cycle a way? And conversely I can menstruate if I just really set my mind to it? I think that claim of yours needs a slight looking at and a fair amount of tinkering before it's "street legal", per se. While we're on the shtick of chastising arguments. :snicker:
Like I said, utterly shallow.
Could the same sentence(s) be said accurately if the words "woman" and "women" were replaced with "man" and "men", respectively? Why or why not?
What would it be like in a world where men never existed and only women did? They would just simply be "human" assuredly? What about a world where there was always three biological genders (say with a third form of genitalia that may or may not allow reproduction with one or more genders, perhaps including one's own)?
I get your point. It may be shallow in the sense that what it means to be a conscious human being is just so deep and rich a topic of discussion that it transcends our biological differences entirely and makes said differences seem ridiculous to talk about in comparison, but, it's still a topic nonetheless that has far reaching social and psychological implications. Having a womb and being expected to literally house an entire human being inside you for 9 months vs. the idea being all but an alien concept to one who doesn't, etc., etc...
Absolutely but there is a power imbalance between the sexes. Physical and social and economic. It has improved dramatically in the last 60 years.
Things may change and women may be happy to share changing facilities in the future but until then female spaces need to be female only.
Quoting Outlander
Then there would be no need for women’s exclusive places.
Quoting Outlander
That isn’t my point. My point there is a biological difference and that affects the way your family, peers, neighbours etc etc react to you. A man does not get the same upbringing as a woman. Combined with child rearing and power imbalance, women and men are different and no man can jump the divide and become a woman. Imho.
The transgender issue IS a rabbit hole, so to even participate is to jump down a rabbit hole and argue with esoteric posters.
Philosophy often involves exploring rabbit holes.
I don’t think it is. It’s an extremely simple issue.
Rabbit holes are sometimes fun but very rarely about the subject being discussed.
Quoting Harry Hindu Why would it be? If everything worked out and they found themselves to be in a fruitful as well as long dating endeavor then found this out. . . should they or should they not continue the relationship? That would depend on the person.
It's like going into a relationship with someone openly intending to want kids only to learn they don't want any, they had their tubes tied, a medical botch, they physically are incapable, they had a vasectomy, etc. Do they drop the relationship or not? That depends on the person.
Remember they have the freedom of choice to continue it or not in light of that. Ethics be dammed.
In a pragmatic sense they need to get a handle on this and both put their cards on the table. That is relationship advice for any sort or type of relationship. Both camps need to make that point expressly clear.
Quoting Harry Hindu I was not one of those people. . . I got what vaccines I could to gain access to what resources I needed or wore masks to respect policies when they were enforced. My parents were middle aged and therefore susceptible at the time as well as worried about it so I respected their wishes to be as safe as possible. In fact, those restrictions actually worsened my mental state and brought about suicidal ideation.
See. . . was it so difficult to ask someone about something? Also. . . thanks. . . for having me bring that all back up mentally.
Further, as shown on myth busters and this article from the national library of medicine the use of paper towels is actually more effective than mere air dryers. Although, that doesn't make all air drying completely unsanitary it depends on a variety of factors.
I would and every other PERSON would like a sense of privacy regardless of anything else we've been discussing when doing our 'business'. It's your pejorative to want to force me to take my dick out in front of strangers to do it but that is just. . . strange.
Quoting Harry Hindu No.
So NOW we can move on to normative guidelines and practice which I'm sure you will give educated or non-fence sitting answers to! Yeah!
Quoting Harry Hindu I don't care. I'm not one of those people.
We've been throwing around things such as gender neutrality, gender equality, gender equity, but this seems to concern more gender normativity. What social roles people are meant to take on.
No! Norms are not strictly speaking. . . legal guidelines. . . policies. . . social fads. . . morals. . . although they may overlap in certain respects with all of those. Mainly because they concern the thing moral guidelines or even laws cannot much touch or say much about. Morally ambiguous or morally neutral aspects of our society or culture at large.
I consider whether one is pro-life or pro-choice to be part of that although it has clear moral and legal standing there is such a wide difference in legality across the states that it is allowed a degree of high normative disagreement. Anti-natalist or Pro-natalist also fall into this as there aren't China like laws that force people to have a specific number of kids but there are concerns that people have about that regardless of whether this concerns the superiority of a culture, economic growth, or social stability.
Quoting Harry Hindu Because I now don't care about gender or sex. . . normativity is king here as it concerns what things people ought to do or not do. It also concerns values. You are expressing that right now in terms of demanding there exist, already existent, terms meant to refer to biological aspects. It's not strictly moral or legal in nature so it probably falls rather nicely into a normative standing.
When you ask me what their 'gender' or 'sex' is from this you are REALLY asking what the normative guidelines and intentions are of the person or the culture/society as regards this persons choices. Whether there are such normative guidelines and whether we should adopt them or not.
To be fair, the consistent "caller of chromosomes", as it were, is not @Harry Hindu, he's simply responding to what information he was given to accept or refute.
Quoting substantivalism
Because people don't like liars. Lies can be small and inconsequential, such as falsely stating you don't know where your good friend's keys are after a night of drinking where he is clearly unfit to operate a motor vehicle. Or they can be fatal. Or unethical, per one's religious belief standards, such as feeding a person who follows a certain religion forbidding the consumption of pork. A person who follows a certain religion that forbids the consumption of pork will not die or burst into flames if they ingest pork. But it brings what can be considered existential shame per their religious belief. Is it foolish? Perhaps. Is it up to you to say what a man's life purpose and pursuit of such purpose should be, where there is no other affected party but the one man? I think not.
Quoting substantivalism
That's fine. Some people don't care about professional sports racing or even life itself. But this is a topic of discussion for people who in fact either do care, or have some relevant knowledge as to the topic at hand.
What isn't really silent on that rather explicitly are normative values. So clearly we should be discussing those.
Quoting Outlander That's all you needed to say. No mention of gender, sex, race, or anything else.
Quoting Outlander More correctly I find the presentation of sex and gender here or elsewhere skirting around normative values.
Harry makes this point in a rather seemingly contradictory manner as he wants people to be 'as they are'. However, he also want them to box themselves into clear and obvious outward categories.
Which is it? Respect people's privacy and let them be as they are or do they have to possess sex coded language, dress, or social roles that a person can notice from a mile away?
Its one thing to have sex coded language but its another to force people to actively present that when it should or could be a private affair.
To be even clearer: Most right-wing activists are 'weirdos', as are most TRAs.
I'm reading this and rubbing my chin trying to figure out what positions are clearly contradictory. It's messy to begin with. Me, I'm generally uncomfortable with activitsts of any kind, but I also recognise that they're often necessary for social change. Here's my position on the trans issue:
I think "being trans" is a thing.
If "being trans" is a thing, then it's definitely a gender-thing.
It might be, in addition, a sex thing. Or, a variety of disparate sex-constellations could give rise to similar symptoms.
I think the way we think about sex is inherently gendered; male/female are both sex categories and gender categories, but they are sex categories in part because they were gender categories first. We could have devided the field differently. As long as we're talking about reproduction, there's fairly little leeway. But the trans-issue is not primarily related to reproduction (as a gender issue).
I find the trans/cis distinction useful. It must start as a gender issue, and we'd need to approach the underlying sex-issue (including if there is one in the first place) in a way similar to the reproduction issue. Sticking to the reproduction-derived male-female typology might inhibit our ability to ask the right questions. Abandoning the male-female binary while researching the trans-issue may be useful; that doesn't imply also abandonding the male-female binary while researching reproduction.
I'm no biologist, and I have trouble understanding some of the more complicated issues. I tried reading papers a couple of years ago... I don't speak biology; it was slow and inconclusive. On top of this, the trans-issue is highly political, so my default attitude towards such papers is one of cautious distrust: I expect wishful-thinking on the activist side and not-my-problem-complacency on the conservative side. I imagine there are middle-of-the-road researches, but I don't know who they are. So I don't trust my intuitions on the topic, and I don't trust my ability to figure out which experts to trust.
Given a minor background in sociology (academic degree, but decades ago and not my job ever since), I'm a little better at reading gender studies. Unfortunately, that just means I can be more specific about my distrust. I'd need to go read the actual studies, and then think through the theories that underly them, and then... I'd simply be exhausted and still not have made up my mind.
Once the dust settles we might get a clearer look of the issue at hand. Part of me fears though that, once the dust settles, we'll go back to not caring much - meaning we might just not look. I'm hoping for positive left-over substratus, but the current backlash doesn't seem to justify that hope. It's like running with a rubber band; either the rubber band breaks and you fall flat on your face, or the you lose strength and the backlash smashes your back into the wall.
The difference between sex and gender is also intuitively clear to me: I have no problem calling myself male - that's a fact. But I can't call myself a "man" with a straight face. The term feels more like a social imposition than something I identify with. Note that "man" isn't only a gender term; it's also an age term. Am I more comfortable with "boy" than "man"? Peter-Pan Syndrome? Maybe. It's also clear to me, that I'm definitely not a girl/woman; that's just intuitively off the table. I take this to mean that I'm "cis male" without much of an gender identity.
When I say I don't have much of a gender identity, what I mean is that, unless the topic comes up, I don't think of myself in terms of gender at all. That can lead to me not making connections that I'm socially supposed to make. An example: I was working at a market research institute, when the boss of a different department needed to have some tables moved (for a group discussion, I think). She enlisted the help of "strong men". Now the department I was in was mostly women, so most people who responded to the call were women, like my friend and colleague, who said something like, "Hey, you come, too." Not only did I not respond to the flattery, I didn't even realise it was supposed to be gendered flattery to make the (few) men in the room feel good about helping. I just thought I'm not strong, so I'm not going to be much help. (I only later learned that we were to move tables, and they weren't that heavy. And most of the table movers ended up women, anyway.) There are also times I got in trouble for being gender insensitive - that is not being able to see myself as a man and thus making (mostly) women uncomfortable with my presence, or something I said. So while I find the trans condition hard to understand (I asked clarification question, at the end of the which the only thing that was clear is that I didn't understand), I also find it hard to understand why the man-woman gender differentiation matters as much as it does. I don't, here, mean an intellectual understanding; more an instinctive understunding. Meaning: I get by well enough when I pay attention; not so much when I relax.
As for the concrete trans issues, say the bathroom issue - my sympathies tend to lie with your avarage trans person who just wants to live a comfortable life like anyone else. Public bathrooms are a source of stress, and that won't change, not immediately at least, even if they're legally allowed in the bathroom of their "choice". Most of the discussions around the topic tend to focus on the lone toilet goer, but what if a transwoman vistis the bathroom with their cis-woman friends? (Something I've heard of once, concretely: being dragged to the toilet by their cis-woman friends, as the transwoman would have preferred to wait until she got home.) So what about insider vetting? It's not the laws, here, I'm primarily concerned with: it's the daily life that structures around them. The szenarios we imagine reveal our preconceptions. If you'd focus on the actual life-paths, things might look different.
This was meant to be a short post that makes things clearer about where I come from. It's certainly not a short post, but it should make clear that the issue to me inherently messy, which puts me in clear opposition to people who think: men here, women there, trans people deluded. To be sure, I started out saying that I think that "being trans" is a thing; that implies (in my world view) that this is something you can be wrong about. So I do think there are people who are wrong about being women, but their being wrong about being a women is secondary to them being wrong about being trans.
A four-spot grid works well enough for me, for now, definitely when it comes to gender.
I think it's more hijacked by those who are larger and less intelligent to bully those who are smaller, skinnier, perhaps talk with a bit higher voice, or are otherwise closer to what modern societies think of as "feminine" simply because they're cruel and miserable people who they know deep down the world would be better off without. You know the kind. The "if I'm not actively oppressing someone, no matter who it is, I don't feel normal — someone has to be inferior and beneath me for me to function properly" type. Horrible people raised by similarly horrible people thus creating a never-ending chain of blight on moral society. Until people like me are given authority by a fatigued and desperate population whose only wish is to live in the heydays of their grandparents when men knew how to act and how to respect one another.
Men are very prideful so calling someone something that suggests they're "less of a man" or "like a girl" or "little boy" that makes the implication they're unable to defend others or themselves, can be quite hurtful, to the point of mental re-configuration ie. trauma if done perpetually, repeatedly, and of course in tandem with violence or other belittlement or humiliation.
If you shout at someone loud enough, and belittle them while doing so, you will re-wire their mind to make them believe anything. It's occultic and hidden in nature but there are forms of psychological torture and programming available across the web that essentially offer step-by-step results on how to do so. I wouldn't recommend looking them up or having that on your history but, they're there. Basically like imagine a woman being kidnapped in her teens and held captive in a literally cage beating beaten, starved, force-fed (or not fed) and being insulted for a decade or longer. Their mind would turn into something unrecognizable and they would believe themself to be whatever the captor wants them to. That's a more dramatic version of what happens with some people who were bullied into believing they're unfit to even share the same gender of some very negative and cruel people.
So, as long as one can acknowledge that the above scenarios are not only possible and could adequately explain many persons who claim to be such, but do in fact happen, alongside the idea that a person may truly have gender dysphoria that came about organically and not by the work of social engineering, peer pressure, or persistent trauma, that's something I could consider as valid.
Other than that, some people just think whatever the "next big thing" is is cool and are trend followers and would falsely identify as someone who has true gender dysphoria, thus depriving the true person with gender dysphoria of their struggle, plight, and rights simply because young and uneducated people whose minds are not even fully developed have a tendency to mis-diagnose themselves if ever given the opportunity to do so as opposed to a thorough multi-session exam by a licensed medical professional.
On the other hand there are trua differences in sexual differentiation and there are true individuals with profound gender dysphoria. That is why such individuals should receive evaluation and treatment at centers with experienced professionals and receive guidance and care there.
This seems quite clearly wrong, unless what you mean by gender is "immature and potentially misinformed prior concepts of sex" which is what I think actually is the case. If so, then yeah. But I can't see that complicating hte current picture.
Sex is sex.
Gender is gender.
They rarely vary independently, but they do in an incredible minority of cases (exception for rule, i suggest).
I agree with Malcolm that this is not in any way complicated. The only complicating factor is people not liking things about themselves, so refusing to wear empirically accurate labels (which is fair, to some degree - but the activism behind it is pernicious, violent and often terroristic).
Quoting Dawnstorm
I can't quite disagree, but I cannot see an avenue to assent to this. Male and female are categories that are not violated. They are useful inherently. I cannot understand a discussion about "trans" that doesn't include the grounding what you're on the "other side" of. That would be sex, no? Genders aren't inherent so you can't actually be "on the other side" of anything. You're just the gender you are.
But then, that's a direct contradiction as to the theory behind being trans: it is a subversive transition from "your gender" to "your chosen gender" or some similarly opaque and unhelpful line. So here's an example of "weirdo" thinking. People can't bear being scrutinized when they run this argument - and you're a bigot for even asking about it. Irrational crap.
Quoting Dawnstorm
Now, that's correct - and socially speaking, the comments i've made above this don't apply. Just be good to people. But when we have males claiming they're going to be getting pregnant, have better vaginas then women, are better women than women and all the rest - you can fuck off, quite frankly. That's delusional, dangerous and insanely misogynistic.
Quoting Dawnstorm
It may be the case that you're reading bollocks (i.e your distrust is well-founded. Almost all philosophical writing on the topic, for instance, is utterly incomprehensible babble, and the science writing is out-right dishonest in most cases). Sex determination is insanely simple - sex differentiation is more complicated, and does not affect which sex an organism is. It relates to only presentational aspects of the organisms body.
Quoting Dawnstorm
Hard to know - it's not possible to publish this type of thing without some ridiculous fanfare and pushback (Tuvel rears her head). There is no middle of the road, as I see it. Either you think people change sex, or you don't. The thing is that it isn't possible for humans to do so. I think you'd be better placed to read basic biology about sex determination, unrelated to this issue. It answers everything, and everyone ignores it.
Quoting Dawnstorm
I would probably agree with this (I have a bit stronger of a gender identity, i'd say). My current lecturer would eat this up. His position is that if we were to abolish gender (insane) cis people (i hate that term, btw. Just people) would lose so much of what they are unaware constitutes their identity with the loss of words like 'man' and 'woman'. Just a side note, realy.
Quoting Dawnstorm
My take: this is their problem. It is not for you to police yourself, unless you can ascertain a wrong. It doesn't sound like there was a wrong here, and instead, you have woman around you prone to misreading things along gender lines. Not unreasonable, but not your problem. I deal with this is largely-female spaces too, but not in mixed spaces. I do not alter my behaviour between those contexts. It seems to be informed by some misguided solidarity and empowerment concept. Can of worms.. feel free to ignore, i guess as its not on-point to the thread.
Quoting Dawnstorm
This implies there is an objective standard to being a woman/man. If "adult human female" isn't it, the entire conversation collapses in on itself. Another weirdo type line, imo. Fwiw, "adult human X" is perfectly sufficient, conceptually. I have a hard time siding with an extreme minority which can totally reasonably be characterized as mentally aberrant, on issues that, for the majority, amount to safety issues (i have provided ample evidence for this throughout the thread). Even if this breaks down into half of females being fine with transwomen among them, and half not - the half who aren't take priority imo. Inviting males into female spaces is not something that would be standard, and so requires assent of at least 50% of females on a level that covers the specific area in which is a policy is to be implemented (i.e within a specific sport club, within a specific lets say night life precinct, within a specific campus etc.. etc.. etc..). I do not think large-scale policy can address this issue unless woman means something objectively determinable(I think the UK have done the 'right' thing, regardless of a moral valence there. It is what works for policy-writing).
Quoting Dawnstorm
Is it posssible you could elaborate here? I get the intuition i would agree, if I understood.
I'm unsure there's such thing as being 'wrong' about being trans, unless there's an objective metric by which a third party could make that call.
Quoting Outlander
Medical professionals are incentivized to do this, via "moral righteousness" and potential kickbacks(which have been widely reported - Jack Turban being a ridiculously obvious shilling example).
But, yes, there is a social contagion aspect here. A psychologist friend of mine who is intensely left wing had to come to me, somewhat hat-in-hand saying "no, you were right. They are collecting diagnoses". It is literally 'cool' to be disordered, and that's been the case since I was a teen.
It seems to me the term gender has been hijacked. It's a perfect reasonable concept to describe societal differences between the sexes. These have changed dramatically over time and are not exclusive to either sex but describe the social differences that are more typically (but not exclusively) relating to one sex or another.
There would be no issue of people commandeering the other gender if there was not significant differences between the two sexes in an few significant areas.
I have no idea why people struggle with the issue other than self importance or delusion..
The concept of gender refers to behaviour and presentation. These are, obviously not 'sexed'. They vary with sex, in most cases. So to me, there's no issue with people claiming whatever gender ID they want whenever they want, along any lines they want. It has to be related to actual gender presentational norms, though (but note: norms. These are not benchmarks, or objectively assessable criteria which leads to...)
The problem, as I see it, is that no one else has to give two squirts of piss about your identity, if it isn't somehow legally understood tout court (i.e sex, ethnicity, religious affiliation etc..) and gender should not be, in any way, a legal concept. It is utterly absurd that there are laws that describe gender as a factor in anything. its so ambiguous as to be essentially unenforceable, other than to assent to screeching children complaining that the world doesn't conform to their wishes.
There's nothing wrong with lamenting the world and your place in it - thinking anyone else needs to do anything about it is a mistake, and in the West, we have (although this seems to have curtailed recently) moved towards policies which enforce some kind of collective assent to people's identities. Ridiculous, and clearly (i.e in action, right now, all around us) a totally failed project.
This is probably a thread of its own. You say later that:
Quoting AmadeusD
And under that concept there's probably no way to make sense of what I said. I'm not quite sure how to be concise here: I think of gender as a socially organised way to order sexual behaviour through our daily praxis. That's probably not making much sense for now. There's a nature-vs.-nurture aspect here, complicating things, too - but basically it's impossible to think about sex outside of gendered concepts. That includes science, as science is social activity. (It's not that important to follow up on this here, and I'd rather not, since this goes in a different direction, but my influences here come from sociology - Husserl-inspired theories [Alfred Schütz, Berger/Luckmann], as well as a little of Mannheim's total ideology. For what it's worth, I think the current confusion follows on from post-Derridan post-structuralism - which mostly left me confused and I don't think there's much influence here - I think I stopped with Saussure...)
Quoting AmadeusD
They're useful inherently for most people:
Quoting AmadeusD
You talk about exceptions for a rule. But if the occurance of exceptions is also rule bound, then you're not going find the rules of the exception while focussing on the binary. The key here is attention. We're not going to find the rules that govern those exceptions. Not because they can't be found that way, but because habitual thought patterns have led us past them for centuries. I don't think we can't; I think we won't. And I think the problem is socially re-inforced complacency: it's not our problem. Unless we're trans.
If there are no biological markers somewhere around sex that regulate those exceptions... how can we tell? If there are, listening to trans people and what they're paying attention to should be interesting.
Of course, right now, it's fashionable to be "trans". High motivation (comparitively to earlier times) to look into it, but also more noise to sift through. It's frustrating.
Quoting AmadeusD
I'd sort of agree with your lecturer, provided this doesn't lead to a political program. It's impossible to abolish gender, I think, since the combination of biological differences and living together in groups will always lead to some sort of gender distinction. However, I do think there's a lot of unaware stuff going on in gender identity. A practical repetition that doesn't even need to be put into words; something you only really run into if you don't fit (say, if you're trans).
Which is why I said "whithout much of a gender identity" rather than "without any gender identity". I walk into the male toilets without a second thought, for once. Socially speaking, I'm unreflected male as much as I'm unreflected cis. I think being trans means that you can't be "unreflected" anything in terms of gender, because the system that would fit you has not socially developed. I see only two possibilities: you must reflect on your gender, or you must find some other area to put your problems in.
So:
Quoting AmadeusD
How else would they put this? I'm fairly pessimistic, though, so I think I agree it's unhelpful. People aren't going to understand them without a way to approach them or disproportionate effort. If we'd encapsulate them in a social category, the need to actually understand would probably lessen. Of course, then we'd likely have a new trans-people-are-like-this problem. Humans tend towards stereotypes.
Quoting AmadeusD
Not much of a problem to be honest. I brought it up as markers of gender identity in a social negotiation context. To what extent I am a man is mostly a fun puzzle I don't take seriously. It passes the time. I can deal with mishaps. But the way they happen do shed light on how I connect with gender.
Quoting AmadeusD
There is an objective standard, but it's in constant flux. Let's take our eyes of gender for now and just look at adult. "Adult" is usually connected with both age and behaviour. An adult can behave childishly without being a child, but an adult can "fail to grow up". Etc. Also, this are all things I've improvised from within a social context. How many years have passed since my birth is pretty much a fact. Beyond that there's an ongoing repetition of imperfectly internalised norms you can be wrong about. But being wrong about something that's in flux... adds to a gauge that might lead to social change if the gauge doesn't empty (pardon the video game language; it comes naturally to me).
So:
Quoting AmadeusD
I start with the assumption that there are trans people; i.e. they arise out of contexts that don't give them the information that trans people exist and still end up seeing themselves that way. Whatever that means isn't clear. Whether that's a single grouping or convergent symptoms isn't clear. But this happens in significant albeit low numbers.
Next, we can find out that trans is a thing and name it "trans" and try to figure out what that is. Experts can do that: anthropologists, sociologists, psychologists, biologists, etc. We get terms that are used in a variety of systematic ways, sometimes incompatible with each other, but experts usually know about this (as they demonstrate when they fight for academic resources).
Then the terms bleed out into "the wild", where they propagate unsystematically. I don't want to go into it too much here, because that's a whole wild topic of its own, but now you have a lot of people calling themselves trans who might never have "figured it this out for themselves". A man who would like to go out in public in womens clothes certainly engages in cross-gendered behaviour, ("cross" being the English word for "trans"), but that doesn't make for a trans person by itself. They overgeneralise.
Overgeneralisations, IMO, are part and parcel of the identity game. I *am* this. I will fight for the right to be this. And so on. The identity game tends to reinforce gendered behaviour, here, as someone who's gender-identity is contested will often seek refuge in hyper-gendered behaviour to make their "chosen gender" more accessible. The fall-out is two-fold:
If you're really trans you might feel pressured into gendered behaviour you don't really want to engage in (voice lessons are common example... or were a couple of years ago). "I guess I have to wear a dress now."
Meanwhile, the guy who simply wants to wear dresses might try to justify that (maybe to themselves) with "I am trans". This assumes a positively marked social category, and with the right political leanings...
The problem here is this: it's hard, and maybe (currently?) impossible to tell the difference from the outside, when all you have is what they do and say.
Quoting AmadeusD
I'm not contesting the evidence you've cited - mostly because to do that I'd have to go to the source; other than the biology paper, I'd at least somewhat be qualified to read them. And I also don't really want to talk about whether or not trans people ought to be allowed in this or that bathroom. It's just that the acutal "safety issue" seems to be secondary to the general discourse around this (especially, since the safety of trans people is usually secondary for people who argue safety). There's an unease around the gender topic that needs to go before any law change might be useful. I'd not be surprised if trans people allowed into "their" bathrooms still choose to avoid public bathrooms, as these places aren't seen as safe. Under this theory, your numbers could be a transition problem (e.g. some of the trans people who do take advantage of the law might be the "vengeful" kind). This is why, ideally, an attitude change would have to come first. But then an attitude change isn't going to come without actual contact. And given that being trans is rare to begin with...
It's all a muddle for me. My sympathies are with the minority, here, though more with the regular person than with the activist. There's something there, I think, we don't quite understand enough.
Ahh ok, that's fair. A slightly stronger version that I would use is all. Fully makes sense of what you're saying though, thank you.
Quoting Dawnstorm
Not quite - I don't think gender and sex are rule-bound. They vary almost interdependently but this is no rule - a mere observation. Does that resolve that tension?
Quoting Dawnstorm
I think this is entirely true, on every level. It simply isn't our problem when others gender and sex vary independently. That's fine. I'm unsure that the preceding comments apply in that light, thought I understand their purpose. I just don't think we're looking for rules (though, i assume TRAs are in order to justify enforcing their identities on others social worlds).
Quoting Dawnstorm
I agree - and i find it entirely uninteresting to speak with trans people about this specific issue. It is a mess, and rarely comes coherent or in a to-be-taken-seriously form, I think. The only claim is that trans people have the brain of the opposite sex. I note this is untrue, and usually only trotted out to support trans women which goes directly to my fundamental scepticism in the area (not about people's ID - but about people's motivations and what that means for society).
Quoting Dawnstorm
This says to me you want to conclude that gender is analogous to sex? I understand that's not what you're saying but it seems so intensely difficult to accept that there's some biological connection without equating the two. What could apply to one, and vary independently in the other?
Quoting Dawnstorm
This speaks to the, what I think is, false narrative around trans stuff. The above doesn't change anything about a strict delineation between child and adult, which we have along two metrics:
1. Age of majority;
2. Having experienced puberty.
Both are objective measures of an adult. The subsequent behaviours and presentations don't alter that. Does this make sense? If so, read across to sex. If Gender has an objective standard, it would need to be to clearly assessable. Gender is not. In fact, gender can be claimed as the opposite to behaviour and presentation (as well as sex). It seems its a category unrelated to either, on the TRA version.
Quoting Dawnstorm
This is definitely true, and is probably why "gender transition" is such a totally incoherent concept in practice. Not that there's a moral value there - just that no one can make sense of what's happening in a transition unless they refer to an objective standard which is not in flux.
Quoting Dawnstorm
I think this is an unfortunate way to proceed. I want to know what that is, before assessing it in situ of another discussion (I realise you've resiled from that, and do not hold you to it - just being clear about any comments that might betray this)
Quoting Dawnstorm
But surely, Gender can only be assessed on those terms, anyway? If its tied to sex, trans people don't have room to make claims they cannot support to others.
Quoting Dawnstorm
I think this is backwards. The safety of trans people (in bathrooms, lets say) is secondary. They are requesting access to a protected space - being the target of the protective measure (i.e male, in this argument anyway). My wife's safety comes before males who want to piss in the same room as she (for she, and I). It is rare for people to put theoretical safety of others above themselves. It might even be a bad move to do so.
Quoting Dawnstorm
It seems to be something somewhat opposite: trans people are determined to access the bathroom they claim, regardless of any safety considerations. Its an affirmation issue. In that light, it seems more likely to be an ignorance of safety on their part, in service of their identity, than much else.
Oh, good. I wasn't sure I'm making sense. For me, there's this intuitive substratus, and then there's the attempt to explain myself. Sometimes I notice myself talking myself into a corner as I speak. Online, that'd be me deleting a post and starting afresh. In real time? It's rather frustrating for the listener.
Quoting AmadeusD
Just to make sure we're on a page: I'm thinking of rules here as "regularities to be observed" rather than "instructions to be followed". And I think only the former can be "objective", though the existance of the latter can be objective in terms of the former. (And we have to be vigilant to tell the two apart since social processes braid the two together in its genesis: theories about what's going on influence behaviour influence theories about what's going on...)
Quoting AmadeusD
I thought the claim I was making here was pretty weak, actually. What I mean is merely that I assume (theorietically, without justification) that what we look at as the "diffence between sexes" will be significant in any society, and people being people, they will always "mythologise" beyond the difference. Not individually, but simply by virtue of living together and accounting for differences with as little friction as possible. So either you have more than two gender category (as organised in daily praxis, as opposed to ideologised in particular discourse), or you have tried and true methods of dismissing the minorities (e.g. considering them deluded).
Again, this is a baseless assumption, as in the real world we can't isolate "societies" (the best we get is really isolated tribes in inaccessible locales such as rainforests, but even they are likely to have some minimal contact). I just need some sort of narrative to think about this.
And all the distinctions I'm making are purely analytic. In real life it's all braided together. My very basic attitude to life is: if something seems clear, you've probably not yet run into troubles. (This is halfway between a slogan and a joke; but it *is* based on a practical attitude.)
I'm also a fairly staunch relativist. I see understanding others as a balancing act: you need to take yourself back to some degree to understand others, but if you take yourself back too far you end up in a place where you no longer understand *anything*. There's no perfect balance, but there's a "useful range". Gender, and this is an impression from experience this time rather than a theoretic assumption, tends to be so deeply rooted in ones daily praxis that it's hard to understand people who have problems here. It's not that you don't see things from their place, you literally don't know the place can exist. I've been interested in this topic since the 1980ies (and I'm born in 1971), and I'm still not sure what it's all about. But it doesn't feel like it has less substance than the male-female distinction. It just feels less familiar.
Quoting AmadeusD
It makes some sort of sense, but I'd need time to let this settle. Off the top of my head, this is already "within the braid", though. Puberty isn't social, but age of majority certainly is. That is 1. is already part of behaviours and presentation, given that age of majority is reliant on concepts such as birthdays in a way that the onset of puberty isn't (though social organisation might "sculpt" the body in some ways - nutrition, avarage rate of bodily movement, etc. - which in turn might influence the avarage age of onset - again, not an expert here, but I think I've heard some things about this?).
Unless you mean something different from the legal concept? (Note the difference between a rigid date placed on birthdays, or coming of age ceremonies based on people becoming impatient if the kid's "not ready yet, when s/he should be?)
My impression is that we both likes our things clear cut, you manage to have them that way, and I don't. We might live our lives differently because of that. Partly a personality difference? Maybe.
Quoting AmadeusD
It's not a way to proceed. It's preparation work to make sense of the world.
Quoting AmadeusD
Yeah, I'm sympathetic to wanting to know. Which is why I venture out of the shadows in such a thread in the first place. Going back to the above, I don't know how to proceed. I'm at a loss. The result is that I do nothing but add my two cents. My intuitive response is to let transwomen into women's bathrooms and transmen into men's bathrooms, but I'm not married to that. I'm not worried about people thinking this should not be allowed. It's a difficult topic that needs to be sussed out - one way or another. But I dislike the insistance that if we do allow that we're "letting men into women's bathrooms" - not because on some level that's not a valid way to present the facts, but because it tends to signal a not-my-problem attitude that's going to be more of a problem than a "no" to the bathroom issue can ever be. Where people have no motivation to take trans people seriously no laws are going to matter.
Quoting AmadeusD
Also, they *have* no protected space being at risk from cis people of either gender. Again, it's not about the bathroom issue. It's that the discourse around them currently tends towards taking them less seriously again. I expected that. It's not a surprise. The backlash was always going to come.
Anecdote alert: when a trans person you've known online only (across the pond, so to speak) suddenly disappears online, I'm worried in a different way. (I always worry. I worry too much. I guess that makes me an expert in the intricacies of worrying?) Drastic change in presence unheard of years; no public announcement. Luckily, nothing bad happened (according to someone closer to her, whom I also only know online). I won't be specific about this. I don't talk about other people when they're not around, beyond the most general of terms.
I agree with you in everything other than
"there's no issue with people claiming whatever gender ID they want whenever they want, along any lines they want"
I think there is an issue. It undermines what it is to be a woman and men cos-playing as women is lamentable.
I have no issue with genuine sufferers of gender dysphoria (which is a tiny percentage of the trans cohort)
As for the girls/young women who are disfigured by the medical professional instead of being given psychiatric help. The less said the better.
This is where we disagree. I think a person is viewed from very a very early age because of their sex. Even in the most liberal and equitable places girls and boys are treated differently. They are given every opportunity to be whoever they want to be and to do what they want but the world treats them differently and this becomes part of the adult. They are a man or a woman because of how the world has interacted with them and how they see them. They may be a very "feminine" man but they are still a man. I don't think a man calling himself as a women, is of any use to anyone.
Quoting Dawnstorm
Quoting AmadeusD
Enter the normative definition of gender that is distinct from social/biological indicators and does not define gender as either rigidly being some particular set of behavioral theater we play out, a form of biological determinism, or some socialized emergent trend. This article here attempts to motivate some version of it in terms of the notion of gender 'fitting'. It being motivated because as the person in the article outlines and we've shown equally well in this thread we can outstrip descriptive agreement in these discussions to still have disagreements about what we consider appropriate to call a women or a man.
In the same sense that,
Norms are not moral or legal dictates nor do they have to be elevated to them.
We need to admit to the fact that despite all this declaration of the freedom of anyone to be who they are or do what they want to do need to acknowledge the benefits afforded to many may in fact depend on what specific choices one makes. Having a family is just one of those choices and choosing not to or to be actively anti-natalist is fine a fantasy for a select few to entertain of their own free accord but if it were elevated to a statistically significant number this could imply far reaching economic, social, or cultural turmoil. In this sense people naturally choose the direction which usually creates benefits for our own economic growth and social stability.
Once we've generalized these choices enough and abstracted them we could call them norms. All societies have these.
The question isn't one of legality. . . or morality. . . or personal viewing of one's self. . . it's a normative discussion as to how much of a slave one should be to the expectations of the society around them. Especially when those norms arise out of literal biological categories since time immemorial.
You can't just 'gender neutral' them away. Unless you are willing to adopt the extreme strategies of actual gender nihilists or gender abolitionists who would in some cases have argued for literally replacing our family/societal system with a communal system of sorts. In particular there was one author I happened to find who goes by Aly E who self-responded in an article to this persons former gender neutral manifesto where its outlined an obvious overlapping of one political strategy in undermining gender norms in general.
It is quite hard to understand what you're actually getting at in this para (the whole thing, not just not part). It seems you want to say that an anti-natalist view is somehow immoral as it would lead to X. But the former, you want to reject that possible framework?
Otherwise, a great post that does, ironically, stay quite neutral. Thanks mate
If Gender is actually something foisted upon you, but it is a collective bargain, so to speak, you would need to opt ouit of the social contract to deny it. That's somewhat fair imo.
I don't see gender as something foisted on you. It's just a description of cultural and social differences between the sexes.
Those differences are changing constantly BUT the sex of a person is a huge factor in the their development.
People can be whoever they wish to be and do not have to play the role that used to be ascribed to the genders. However, there is no doubt in my mind a woman and a man have different experiences growing up and biology plays a factor in physical development and to a smaller extent with hormonally BUT the way the world reacts to either sex is a huge factor on the development of all adults.
People can do whatever they want but cannot alter how they developed as a child and adult.
So, I don't see changing a gender as possible since it's just a description of aggregated and changing social norms. IMHO.
Animals that don't fit in are ostracized. Ostracization in the animal kingdom has a 90%+ rate of death. Are you religious and believe humans are set apart from animals? If not, you believe in science. And that is the science. So, you happen to be incorrect in any and all practical sense, if so.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
Not all descriptions are valid or above all beneficial to the advancement of an intelligent species. Maybe you're bigger than me and I'm smaller than you. That would, in a contemporary caveman sense, make me inferior. But. In reality, if I'm smarter than you, despite you and even the world around you being wholly unaware of not only the fact itself but what the fact effectively means for the improvement of said society, that description should be considered invalid and only held by fools. So, it's complicated. There's no black and white when it comes to this level of social cohesion with so many moving parts, known and unknown, understood (allegedly) and not.
The only response to that is LOL.
Quoting Outlander
So what? Do descriptions have to be above all beneficial to the advancement of an intelligent species?
There are aggregated societal differences between the sexes. Gender describes those differences. What is your point?
That's great. You made an inaccurate statement, that statement basically being: "social expectation is not required (forced upon [anyone])". Scientific facts and reference along with common sense posted has addressed and proven said falsehood. You need to remember, this is a serious discussion forum. Please maintain decorum.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
So it's not a logical point that has any relevance in this or any discussion.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
No, those that don't, fade away in place of those that do. What we call in the business a "red herring." The idea that something is popular (ride sharing or perhaps slavery) doesn't make it right, conducive, or part of the greater future going forward. You should know this.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
Naturally. "Societal" differences just reminds me of fluid dynamics applied to psychology ie. "water chooses the path of least resistance" or in more lax terms "what the majority of people happen to think." Sure, the apple (an intelligent social being's observation and opinion of biological fact) doesn't fall far from the tree (biological fact itself). It's a great indicator, but it's no bullseye. No, not in every case and scenario.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
It is the social zeitgeist of what is desired and nothing more. Sure, often based on what's best for a given society in a given time and at a given place. But nothing more.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
What has been my point since the beginning, logic and refinement of views and opinions for the betterment of society. What is yours, if I may ask?
The statement was gender is not foisted upon anyone.
What is expected of a woman in 2025 in Western liberal democracies? What gender specific thought or action is "foisted" upon them?
Quoting Outlander
Another LOL
Quoting Outlander
What isn't a logical point? That girls and boys are treated differently as they develop? Is that not logical?Quoting Outlander
Differences between the genders will fade away? They will definitely change but they won't fade away because there are some problematic biological issues that mean there are differences that will won't fade away. Why is it problematic if some females prefer certain stuff more than males and vice versa?Quoting Outlander
Are you denying such differences exist? What world do you live in?
Quoting Outlander
I have I said otherwise? What is more, no one is forced to adhere to the differences. (Well, not where I live.)Quoting Outlander
What have I said is not based on the way the world is?
What do you object to, if more women prefer a bottomless brunch and more men prefer the footy? It's not as if they are exclusive for either gender.
But it clearly, without sense of doubt, is. This is probably hte least-arguable aspect of the debate.
If you feel otherwise, that's a shame.
No one has to conform to any gender stereotype.
How is gender foisted on someone?
Explain the process.
(imo) the entire basis for 'gender dysphoria' is that genders are 'foisted' upon people who, naturally, would not conform to that particular set of behaviours. It is, quite simply, bullshit, that the world does not create expectations and standards for gendered behaviour. These are unavoidable in early life.
If you want to just say that "foisted" is too harsh of a word, that's fine - conditioning is decent enough. Gender is a set of expectations which play out in real time as against the developing behavioural tendencies of all children. We seem to have agreed that this is the case. If gender were not foisted upon people, we literally would not have gender dysphoria. Social ostracization and expectations to conform to 'typical' behaviours is an extremely potent aspect of growing up. If your gender and sex align perfectly, you'll have not noticed this. In reality, many people don't have that (I did not) and suffer the pressure of conform to social norms around gender.
My previous posts you have engaged with have said as such. I was asking specifically in 2025 what gender stereotype do people have to conform with?
Quoting AmadeusD
I have no issue with this. I have so in my previous posts which (I assume) read since you responded.
Quoting AmadeusD
If you had started with that then maybe some decent exchange may have taken place.
Quoting AmadeusD
There are many pressures in life and you may live in a conservative part of the world but what social norms are you pressured into? How is this any different to anyone else?
Nobody has to do anything (other than obey the law). But there are still expectations, e.g. men propose and women take their husband's surname.
Exactly. The world has come on really well, in certain aspects, over the last couple of centuries.
I would say that people have used gender terms in some form or other across time and culture. Without necessarily being aware of it in that way.
Quite some people across the political spectrum from the one extreme up to the other occasionally or at some point have used a gender term that they believe exists.
Some of these are, woman, man, beta male, alpha male, "not a real woman", "not a real man" and so on.
And some people even extremes that would call themselves alpha male. Probably are alpha male in terms of gender expression. But gender fluid (going from beta to alpha) internally.
For sex you can choose to define it as
woman (sex) = person with xx chromosomes
man (sex) = person with xy chromosomes
Definitions can't be true but they can be useful. So for different uses we can have different definitions. Surely for medical and scientific and epistemic reasons the old definition is useful.
For social reasons a different is also useful. However if we use the same word. We are begging for equivocation fallacies and for the opposite of what language is meant to do. Namely to help us navigate and understand each other clearly. (any person less likely to exert thoughtful cognitive effort show the effects of this and I don't want to be condescending either since it is understandable)
Feminine is now often woman (gender).
Now the chromosome based definitions is strong it for example explain why a woman (sex) is still a woman (sex) if she loses her breasts. And why a man (sex) is still a man (sex) if he becomes a eunuch. A eunuch would be a man (sex) without a penis.
Additionally
Gender was used way before we used it.
When a lesbian or "masculine" or just neutral woman was told to act more feminine. Or to act as a woman (even though she obviously was one). Or when the Godfather told Johnny Fontane to "act like a man". Even though Johnny obviously was a man.
Clearly The Godfather didn't mean that Johnny was not a man (sex) but they did mean that Johnny wasn't acting in line with the cultural/personal idea of how a man (sex) should act. But he does say it in a descriptive way. So he wasn't acting like a man (gender).
So this is important. It's nothing new really. We just became more aware of it. But there's a potential drawback in defining gender without ant reference point.
Ofcourse if one were to say that a man (gender) is someone that wears pinks clothes with lace thong and has a vagina and was born with a vagina. Then that wouldn't really be in line with the common idea of what a man is. Neither sex not gender.
We can accept someone saying this for moral reasons. But for other moral reasons we must recognize that if this is how we generally used language we'd be in the dark. And so most people don't use language in that way.
Some frame of reference is helpful. Surely we can dismiss of genitals in the gender concept and focus gender on secondary or some primary traits. And we can cherry pick them as we please (meant in a good and respectful way). But the less we have some kind of essence the more likely people will be confused.
I mean a person born with xy chromosomes and a penis (man sex). Who feels they are a woman (gender). And wants to express as such. In general will not want to express and transition to become a person that looks as what most people would call an alpha male. So some essence (be it without the need for genitals) is helpful and very reasonable.
So to conclude. Gender can be filled as we want but some essence is healthy.
Some would try to mingle sex and gender and I have noticed that this happens on either side of the debate. (Which we luckily can still have).
I think it's useful to recognize that at some point we have to draw a line somewhere such that we can point to things in reality with words such that we understand eachother.
Even if hormones are ultimately what makes us man or woman (sex). Since that is what DNA ultimately is meant to bring forth. And even if it is difficult to detect exactly where the distinction is. Especially then it is helpful to use genetics as a way to resolve it.
Surely if a virus breaks out that requires a different vaccine for people with xx chromosomes and XY chromosomes we would want to be safe enough to use such words. And equally we should be safe enough to have words for how one feels or wants to express.
However I do think it is possible to be wrong about oneself. If I were to say that I have two legs. Then the only thing that makes that objectively true is me having two legs. If I have one leg then the proposition is false.
If I a man (sex) were to say that I am a woman (sex) that's not possible. Given the definitions with chromosomes.
If I a man (sex) were to say that I am a woman (gender). Then it's reasonable (even a duty by clinics?) to perform a Socratic questioning method.
If I were to say that for me woman (gender) is someone that wants to wear female clothes. Someone that wants to be with men. Wants to wear makeup. Wants to have breasts and so on.
Then whether I am a woman (gender) depends on whether I am the person that wants those things which I just gave as my hypothetical personal definition that aligns with the words in the proposition.
But if I were a man (sex) and I were to say that I am a woman (gender). And when asked what is that for you? I respond with. A woman (gender) is a person with xx chromosomes, with a vagina.
Then if we are equally epistemically virtuous we can recognize that if my statement is to be true. Then it would require me to have xx chromosomes, and a vagina. So in that hypothetical the statement would be false.
My point was actually more (I think) to do with that this claim doesn't quite fit with your previous posts.
Quoting Malcolm Parry
Why would it need to be different? Some people are more resilient to social pressure than others. Probably that note between Michael and yourself speaks to this, but some people are emotionally not able to deal with it. I, personally, think this is why the hard left exists. The fear of 'leaving' when you realise how batshit a lot of those views are is real.
I think we are on the same page.
I am far more robust regarding society. I think a lot of modern attitudes and beliefs are utter nonsense. The fragility of people’s psyche and mental health I find baffling. Maybe philosophy needs to step up a bit in the modern world and give a bit of guidance.
Luckily, I live in a fairly sane part of the world and can ignore most of the craziness. The craziness I do find amusing.
I think this is a bit of 'curse of knowledge'.
I've outlined elsewhere that my Wife and I, having come up against this ssame confusion, realise that we must be in some "upper" group when it comes to self-reliance, will and problem solving. It seems most people are in the 'lower' group. This creates a picture of hte world which is either:
1. Entirely baffling, and unhelpful; or
2. One in which "I" (whoever is speaking) is somehow "superior" intellectually/emotionally to most people.
Neither seems 'good', but the latter seems 'true'. And in that light, it's not longer baffling to us (and the few friends who we've laid that out to - no one disagrees lol just varying degrees of discomfort (which I concur with))
No more competence here than in the legislature?
The practical problem is that males shouldn't be in intimate spaces with females, regardless of their personal beliefs about themselves. I'm no threat to women in bathrooms either, you see.
The incompetence comes from trying to accommodate both of those aspects.