BBC Bitsize - Pronouns

How would you guess? Could you give some characteristics which would help identify whether they prefer he / she / xir / far?

I'm still hopeful for some guidance on this?

Ask someone who does know them.

I meant if they were complete stranger. If you are in the city centre and see an adult human female wearing an amazing hoody and want to describe them to a friend eg "I saw this [person?] in town [pronoun] was wearing...."

you're used the word gender twice since my post asking for clarification jj and still not shown your working

how are we defining a 'female gender'?

what are some example characteristics of someone who has one?

For "W was hat" read "what"!

Imagine a child has run away, the most usual reason for a child going missing, and part of the reason they were distressed was their gender identity, do you think misgendering them would get them home sooner?

I'd have thought that both the child's sex and their gender presentation would need to be made clear. (Which isn't what's happened in the case of escaped sexually violent male prisoners, in some infamous cases)

guys guys, I don't think jj understands the difference between sex and gender. Who wants to tell them?

You can probably usually make a good guess, but asking someone if you're unsure is fine.

W was hat am I basing my guess on? Come to that, what gender am I? I am a woman, I know that because I am an adult human female. How do I work out what my gender is?

You can probably usually make a good guess, but asking someone if you're unsure is fine

How would you guess? Could you give some characteristics which would help identify whether they prefer he / she / xir / far?

How do you ask someone if you don't know them and have never and will never speak to them?

She's my mother. In both the sense that she gestated me and raised me. Had I been adopted I would have a birth mother and an adoptive mother

So you can have a birth mother or an adoptive mother, despite biology. Bit like you can have a trans woman and a non trans woman. Either these words and concepts are set in stone or they aren't.

You are assuming they ran away. What if they were taken. Shoved into some joggers and a t shirt . Hair shaved or put up under a hat...

I think knowing you were looking for a boy or girl would get them home sooner.

Confusing the issue with make pronouns fir a little girl would just confuse the matter.

And how would anyone observe a trans child if they changed the clothes and hair? There would literally be nothing to identify them as trans.

You would have ro ve honest about the sex of the child

Imagine a child has run away, the most usual reason for a child going missing, and part of the reason they were distressed was their gender identity, do you think misgendering them would get them home sooner?

Duolingo tells me that it's correct to use 'es' (it) for a girl, because the word for girl (das Madchen) is neuter. So it appears to be correct for German at least.

Not quite right. True, it is "das Maedchen", but only because it has the suffix "-chen" which is always neutral, like the other diminutive, "-lein". Die Frau, the woman, can become "das Frauelein" and der Mann, the man, can become "das Maennchen".

So when you say "gender" you are talking about something you only know by asking a person?

You can probably usually make a good guess, but asking someone if you're unsure is fine.

Honestly. It's the height of enough. Lol.

Women wanting to define themselves politically? Ruuuude.

And if Dworkin agreed with this shit I would disagree with her. I tell you what though, if you can convert Datun I'll be impressed.

you'll definitely be able to give us a meaningful definition of your Favourite and Best and Most Real and Useful Concept Ever!

i love playing 'watch the genderist avoid explaining their beliefs as they don't want to admit how fucking sexist they are' it's one of my best games

but I expect jj 's beliefs aren't sexist AT ALL and they're currently typing out a water tight non sexist definition of 'female gender'

It's rude, it's stigmatising, it makes people feel uncomfortable and unwelcome, potentially outs them and at worst opens them up to be a target of transphobic abuse. I don't really care about an argument about equivalence, it's rude, end of.

End of. Snort. Don't be silly. Refusing to be forced to call people by the wrong sex isn't 'rude'.

And stop trying to make this about individuals. It's nothing of the sort. It's about being able to define women as a political class, a biological class and a linguistic class.

And I'm quite sure, for some people, it is entirely 'unwelcome'.

'Rude' 🤣

Should we refuse to use someone's married name, should we insist on referring to someone as your adopted parent rather than your mother, should we refuse to use the term gay and only use male homosexual when referring to someone etc. We modify our language for the comfort and dignity of others all the time, it's called being polite.

We do these things, and correct ourselves when we're wrong, not only to be polite. We do so because it's the truth, and we are correcting ourselves if we make a mistake.

Whereas in the trans demands it's the other way around. We are using the correct vocabulary and being told to lie instead. That's actually quite rude.

What @ErrolTheDragon said.

[quote jj1968]@EvenSupposing

So what is the word for the person who gestated you?[/quote]
She's my mother. In both the sense that she gestated me and raised me. Had I been adopted I would have a birth mother and an adoptive mother (and probably a foster mother) and I would work out from context which meaning was being asked for in conversation 'Is it your mother's birthday next week?' versus 'Do your mother or father have glaucoma?'

Is this complex?

Yes come on jj you're here waffling on about gender when the rest of us are talking about sex - you'll definitely be able to give us a meaningful definition of your Favourite and Best and Most Real and Useful Concept Ever!

Exciting isn't it, what young people are doing. I suspect many second wave radical feminists such as Dworkin and Firestone would heartily approve. How can gender continue to function as a system of social control based on physical sex if there are a near infinite number of genders?

Because unfortunately (genuinely) it's unlikely that this will be effective in abolishing sex-based discrimination. At the end of all this genderism, women will still find themselves the second sex in a chromosomally determined caste system. It doesn't matter one jot what 'gender' you identify with - in the real world, structural sexism will still discriminate against pregnant women, mothers etc. Male athletes will still be faster and stronger than female athletes. Etc.

Presumably because that matches her gender.

That's irrelevant. Pronouns belong to the describer, not the described.