Difference Between Sex and Gender?

32 replies

OhFFSDH · 14/07/2018 23:18

This has probably been done to death but I'm trying to explain this to DH and hitting a brick wall. He thinks they are the same. Can anyone provide me with a good source or journal papers where this discusses this in detail?

I have given him a dictionary and he has just looked at different variations in meaning for gender to prove his point when I have studied psychology and sociology and have been taught differently. My books are in storage so I can't even show him what I mean.

OP posts:

ErrolTheDragon · 15/07/2018 00:04

Maybe ask him if he thinks someone 'genderfluid' like Pips Bunce actually changes sex several times a week. If not, how can he assert sex= gender?

theOtherPamAyres · 14/07/2018 23:59

I'm going to stop using the word 'gender' for a bit. I had a breakthrough when speaking to a couple of acquaintances:

Me: 'Our troubles are over. Soon we'll be able to change sex by filling in a form. We can all be men at the click of a mouse"
Both: "Don't be ridiculous. You can't change sex"
Me: "Yes you can. No operations, no hormones, keep the same clothes - just fill in a form and the government will give you a new birth certificate to prove that you really are a man."
One: It's a joke. I don't believe you.

Me: No joke.

Two people peak-transed by removing the terms that people find so confusing. Result!

LightofaSilveryMoon · 14/07/2018 23:58

Just cut your losses and ltb?

Original poster

OhFFSDH · 14/07/2018 23:50

He has said if a man is born with no male organs is he male or female? If a woman is born with no womb is she not female? I'm so sick of bloody talking about it but he's asked me if these mutations exist how is the biological definition of the term 'sex' black and white. He's being the biggest GF

OP posts:

Floorplan · 14/07/2018 23:41

Gender is a human construct and thus varies with time and place: in some countries men wear what are essentially dresses, in some places women have many necklaces on their elongated necks ie gender varies.

In mammals sex does not vary beyond XX and XY unless there has been a problem of development. Trans people like to use developmental problems as representative examples, but that, sadly, is like saying that polydactyly in an occasional child means mammals don't have 5 digits.

LightofaSilveryMoon · 14/07/2018 23:35

How would an experienced livestock farmer feel, about advice telling them that a field full of bulls and bullocks is no problem and that their herd really will increase in time, even though it includes only bulls and bullocks?!

UpstartCrow · 14/07/2018 23:25

Sex is the scientific description.
Gender is the way we behave according to the expectations of our culture.

Sex;
Humans are a sexually dimorphic species. Females have XX chromosomes, and produce gametes that transfer mitochondrial DNA to the offspring.
Males have XY chromosomes and produce motile gametes that determine the sex of the fetus and do not transfer mitochondrial DNA to the offspring.

Gender;
Girls like pink and are kind.
Boys like blue and are noisy.

Unflip

1 2