To start a campaign to prevent clinics from offering "gender scans"

[NNChangeAgain]

I've been following the trans debate, both here and in RL and it strikes me that most of the disagreement and arguments stem from the language and words used.

One of the biggest misunderstandings is the way in which the word "gender" has become interchangable with the word "sex". And no one is more guilty of that than the clinics which offer "gender scans" during pregnancy.

They are not gender scans though, are they? They are scans to determine the external sexual organs of the foetus. Even a foetal blood test identifies the genetic sex of the baby, not the gender.

Is this misrepresentation? Telling a pregnant woman the "gender" of the baby they are carrying is impossible - surely it should stop? And just maybe, it would begin to resolve some of the conflict over the trans debate at the same time ?

Both different hospitals I had ds1 and ds2 in wouldn't give gender scans.
I personally didn't want to know anyway.
They are 25 and 21 now, the hospital said it was because some religions terminated if it was a girl.
Moving on to dd now 12, different area and they were happy to tell gender.

I get where you are coming from, and yes the recent madness has came around because of some (purposely at times) confusing gender and sex.

To most who know nothing of the madness though, gender is just another way of saying sex. Same as to most woman is just a way of saying adult human female. Its a small group attempting to hijack these words. I don't think we should play to it to be honest.

This is daft, like who is at the hospitals handing out genders to babies?

Its daft indeed, but many subscribe to the nonsense. This is why there are abbreviations such as AMAB (assigned male at birth) AFAB (assigned female at birth) and so on. Apparently our sex is chosen, not noted. Batshit.

This thread is fascinating, I've spotted three entirely different interpretations of the OP so far, only one of which is remotely accurate. How can we hope to hold onto our language if we can't read an OP?

I think there are different interpretations possible, MistresssIggi.

Both "gender/sex interchangeable or not" and "what a non-issue/this is hugely important" are valid even if you don't agree.

Trans people don't want to be masculine or feminine. They on the whole want to have to body of and look like the opposite sex not gender

No, no, no, no, no. This is seriously transphobic. Transsexual people want the body of the opposite sex. Transgender just want to dress as the opposite sex and be known as she. And sometimes transgender don't want to change anything about themselves at all but still be known as a woman.

I would understand gender to mean how a person interprets their sexuality based on BOTH genetic and sociological factors. If others agree then surely for a foetus gender and sex are essentially interchangeable terms because at this point in it's life the foetus has no sociological understanding of gender, or masculinity / femininity, so their gender will purely be based on whatever genetic characteristic they have. Only once they are born and socialised into the world will 'gender' have any real meaning different to 'sex'. Unless you are imagining that that there foetus's out there that are in the womb thinking 'I appreciate I have a male sexual organ but actually I prefer to identify as a female', or 'since I have a vagina I better play with dolls'. If so you have had a very advanced baby who should probably report to NASA. Frankly my DD seemed far more interested in milk when she was born that an understanding of gender constructs.

Not those ones pax posters have come on to debate the availability of sex scanning, for example.

True, MistresssIggi. I actually thought that's what it would be about when I opened it.

This is all well & good banging on about gender = social construct & sex = biology but what do we call the males with Klienfelter's and the females with Turner's? To say XX is a female & XY is a male is too simplistic.

We call them males and females, with a chromosomal abnormality. The existence of anomalies like this doesn't alter the definition of what it is to be biological male or female.

I read a good analogy about that - just because the colour purple exists, doesn't mean red and blue don't exist.

Intersex conditions are an abnormality.

The thing is op, in RL, most people don't care about the nit picking over the word 'gender'.

The 'trans issue' and the 'big trans debate' and all the agonising over a word is something i've only ever seen on mn.

I read a good analogy about that - just because the colour purple exists, doesn't mean red and blue don't exist.

That might be a good analogy for gender as it is a spectrum, but it is not a good analogy for male and female which is a binary characteristic and there is no spectrum.

Sorry, that was an analogy with regard to intersex. So purple (XXY, for example) is a combination of red (XX) and blue (XY), but purple's existence doesn't mean red and blue don't exist.

Maybe it's not such a great analogy after all .

I've also only ever seen this 'trans debate' idea on MN.... I don't think the rest of the world care that much to be honest

Debates get dropped and forgotten when the next new thing comes along anyway

I've also only ever seen this 'trans debate' idea on MN

Thats because MN is one of the few mainstream places on the internet where it can mostly be discussed.

And because the rest of the world doesn't care, doesn't mean it matter.

We are in the middle of a mass extinction event, no-one gives a shit, but it is important.

Oh ffs, are we now pushing the trans agenda on to babies in the womb??? Such comments are really no help to the small minority (sorry it is a small minority not every other person as some would like it to be in an effort to make themselves feel better) who really do suffer from being in the "wrong" body. The vast majority of people born with a penis will be male both biologically and psychologically etc. those without will almost all be physically and psycologically female. Yes this is true even if a boy goes through a stage of loving pink unicorns or a girl asks santa for a football kit and hates her period. Where individuals fall into the small minority they deserve to be helped not have their thoughts and feelings hijaked by some twat stating you shouldn't label a baby in the womb as male or female because they haven't had the opportunity to express their preference (bangs head against wall at what this world is becoming)

where individuals fall into the small minority they deserve to be helped not have their thoughts and feelings hijaked by some twat stating you shouldn't label a baby in the womb as male or female because they haven't had the opportunity to express their preference.

I don't have an issue with labelling a foetus at all - but it seems to me that assigning a 'gender' to a baby at birth (or before) is significantly contributing to the pain and suffering of the few individuals that you say need help.
If society using language correctly helps them, why shouldn't we do that?

Whose post are you replying to?

mistressiggi I quoted part of secretmetalfans post.

Honestly, who truly gives a shit?

I find the Mumsnet obsession with Trans issues weird at the best of times, but this takes the bullet.

I'm not sure that the vast majority of people really care about the difference on a day to day basis.

and

Honestly, who truly gives a shit?

I find the Mumsnet obsession with Trans issues weird at the best of times, but this takes the bullet.

^^this

I don't know of anyone who has been discussing this outside of MN. I mean, I'm sure people are but honestly, I don't get it.

I suspect your time would be better spent elsewhere

I still want to know what percent of the UK population is trans.

But surely it is the case that when a sex is determined at a scan, for 99.999% of people, that will correspond with their gender.

Current trends in society place doubt on that statistic.

How many people are trans? As a % of UK population?

Do you understand that assuming everyone who doesn't identify as trans proves that sex and gender correspond is incredibly problematic, Sansa?