“ JoodyBlue
I think I may have been guilty in the past of sealioning. Because in a discussion I kept bringing the conversation back to "what is a woman?" In discussion with a TRA the answer is "anyone who feels like woman" and the rejoiner is "what does a woman feel like?" etc. The question is foundational which is why I kept asking it. In the end the person I was "conversing" with called me a curious bigot and flounced off. Do you reckon I was sealioning there guys?”
I can’t answer the second question, but as someone you might well consider a ‘trans rights activist’, can I attempt to give an explanation of what I think gender identity is, other than ‘it’s just what you feel like’?
I believe a person’s gender identity is the part of their sense of self that results from growing up and living in a society where everyone is publicly labelled as male or female from birth, and subjected to a variety of powerful norms and expectations relating to that categorisation.
Regardless of the fact that my parents are pretty anti gender norms, and encouraged both me and my brother to wear/play with what we wanted regardless of whether they were typically for girls or boys, the influence of the media, other children, school etc inevitably played a big role in forming my sense of myself as a female. And I’m not trans, so I have accepted and incorporated all of that into my identity - I identify as a woman, and that means that I present myself in a way that causes others to automatically recognise me as a woman - I wear women’s clothes, I have long hair, i walk and talk in a certain way.
It’s complicated, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t real.