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Sam Smith coming out as non-binary - help me understand!

531 replies

namechangeblah2019 · 15/09/2019 03:01

Name changed for this in case it gets messy.

I don't know if you've seen in the news but the singer Sam Smith came out as non-binary recently and has now asked that people use they/them pronouns with regard to them.

Absolutely not a problem with using those pronouns - I'm not a fan of theirs particularly so it's unlikely that they'll be cropping up that much in conversation anyway!

But - and I promise I am not being obtuse here, I am just old and slow but I am willing to learn Grin - what exactly is non-binary? I just can't wrap my head around it. Surely the existence of non-binariness as a concept positions it as an alternative to an existing binary (i.e. men being macho and loving beer, women being all pink and girly and love wine) which I thought we all got over (or are meant to be getting over - sadly some people are very slow on the uptake!) anyway?

If I put on a pair of trousers or drink a pint or watch football I don't feel any less like a woman. I still feel like namechangeblah2019. How can you both refute the existence of a gender binary but also claim to be outside of it?

Please be kind to me - as I say I'm not implying they are wrong at all and if that is how they feel most comfortable being referred to then good on them and we should all respect that! I just want to learn as I currently feel like a right old fogey Blush

OP posts:
UniversalAunt · 15/09/2019 09:50

@Whatwouldbigfatfannydo sums it up nicely.

‘It's a big pile of nonsensical, farcical idiocy.’

We’ll look back on these times, I hope, as some form of existential crisis of a highly privileged first world culture.

As a seasoned feminist (C20th edition) for me, use of they/them was an quick adjustment of speech to counter gender assumptions that a role or attribute was exclusively for either men or women.

In those times, sex was what you were born as I.e. male or female, sexuality was defined by who you fancied or had sex with (already controversial e.g. bi-sexual, celibate homosexuals) & gender was about stereotyping roles & attributes based on or allocated to a sex, e.g. pink for girls, blue for boys, the surgeon is male, real men eat quiche, women are not technical etc.

Most people got the gender distinction.

Where things became skewed is when gender was used as a term in academia to define sex, this error has become commonplace, & is now being hard coded in to everyday use.

Sex is binary - male or female - except for the very few born with a form of chromosome variation & the response to sex-related hormones. In this case, the exception proves the rule.

In such complex cases where is ambiguity, a sex may be ‘acquired’ or given for the purpose of birth registration & other matters until the child has matured. Interestingly, this is being played out in the international sporting arena about female athletes with the intersex condition hyperandrogenism.

So, sex is not about feeling male or female. How one feels about being male or female may be a consequence of interpreting the expectations, social mores, attributes defined by gender roles. So gender-neutral to me is more inclusive, something that is not specific to men or women, & equally applicable to men or women. Gender-neutral does not mean without sex.

LordProfFekkoThePenguinPhD · 15/09/2019 09:50

Live and let live? Absolutely.

Shame some people are desperately trying to shove women aside and steal spaces, shortlists, scholarships, and tell women that they are just a feeling in someone’s head. You see that don’t you?

Fresta · 15/09/2019 09:53

Sex and gender were originally the same thing! It's only since people started deciding that they were not the actual sex they were born, that a new definition of biological sex and gender has been invented. It's unnecessary though because it doesn't matter what you do to your body, what you wear, how you behave etc. you cannot ever change your sex, only your interpretation of your sex. You cannot ever say that you don't feel like a man or a woman-your sex determines how you feel and you have no control over that. If you are a man who says they feel like a woman then you are disillusioned- you have no idea how a woman feels because you are not one- you are just a man who feels like a man who imagines what it is like to be a woman.

The only solution to this gender crisis phenomenon is that we accept that you can dress, behave and live how you like without denying your gender. That there is no defining way of being a woman or a man- be how want to be!

LordProfFekkoThePenguinPhD · 15/09/2019 09:54

^The only solution to this gender crisis phenomenon is that we accept that you can dress, behave and live how you like without denying your gender’ - what like the 70s and 80s then?

But then people wouldn’t be special and brave.

JustTurtlesAllTheWayDown · 15/09/2019 09:54

There is a tonne of very intelligent writing about this online by those who have actually experienced these feelings and can explain better than most here. I've read a lot in an attemot to discover more.

One of the odder claims I keep seeing in trans circles is this idea that gender critical people haven't had to think about gender and therefore they dont have the experience to know what they're talking about.
The idea that a group of feminist women, often lesbians, would never have thought about how gender affects them is just ludicrous. Thinking about the issues of how womens lives interact with gender is probably 90% of the reasons they call themselves feminists.

NeurotrashWarrior · 15/09/2019 09:54

Gender fluidity is fine.

It's called personality.

No animosity to that on mn as far as I've seen.

It's where it's part of an ideology which says you must physically irreversibly medicate and alter the body to fit that stereotype and where males can invade female only spaces that there's an issue.

Fine to body modify if you are an adult. Go ahead, the artist Orlan has done it loads of times in the name of art.

In a digital social media age however, children and yp are fully aware of what adults do. And become terribly depressed with their bodies and seek to do the same.

It's all part of the same ideological bullshit that is also about body image, stereotypes and wanting to 'fit in.'

Just be yourself.

NeurotrashWarrior · 15/09/2019 09:58

Live and let live!

Of course!

Famous nb Lachlan had the mastectomy at 18! Lachlan is an adult, that's great!

Lachlan has 577k followers on Instagram.

Ya know, insta, that has also recently had a huge issue with self harm influencing young people with disastrous consequences.

This is clearly one of Lachlan's proudest achievements so far.

TheFaerieQueene · 15/09/2019 09:59

I don’t give a flying fuck how someone perceives themselves.

What I do give a flying fuck about is the eroding of women as a sex, their space and experiences. We will not be diminished.

pickme · 15/09/2019 10:03

Just mean SS is a normal boring human like the rest of us, I don't wake up put on a pink dress and than god I am a sweet smelling woman, no I get up, wash, and dress, some days I fancy trousers some days dresses. I navigate my day without tripping over or thinking of my gender. I put bins out and hoover the carpet (I lie! I don't do either!)
Simply put, in this age of "specialness" it no longer cuts the mustard to just be special because everyone is.

colourlessgreenidea · 15/09/2019 10:03

I'm still struggling to get my head round this. When did gender stop.being linked to our assigned sex?

You are not assigned a sex. You are biologically male or biologically female.

‘Gender’ is a set of socially-constructed beliefs associated predominantly with each of the biological sexes: girls like pink and play with dolls, boys like dinosaurs and football.

LordProfFekkoThePenguinPhD · 15/09/2019 10:04

Trying to be special I guess. A great talent would make someone special. Alas.

PuffHuffle5 · 15/09/2019 10:06

Sam Smith is a really boring celebrity and is trying to make himself sound more interesting...

Trimummy3 · 15/09/2019 10:09

Ok...but where did these ideas of gender come from? I mean they can’t have just been made up....

I’m imagining some caveman dividing up the likes: right, girls will like pink, boys will like blue, green will be liked by both.... boys won’t touch the babies, girls don’t know how to light fire....

It will have come from somewhere... and keep looking the answer is our biological sex... gender isn’t made up!

TheProdigalKittensReturn · 15/09/2019 10:10

About 100 years ago pink was for baby boys and blue was for baby girls, so...

Fresta · 15/09/2019 10:11

‘Gender’ is a set of socially-constructed beliefs associated predominantly with each of the biological sexes: girls like pink and play with dolls, boys like dinosaurs and football.

What a load of crap- gender has absolutely nothing to do with the above- those are gender stereotypes and liking pink and playing with dolls absolutely does not make you a girl!

LordProfFekkoThePenguinPhD · 15/09/2019 10:11

And plenty of babies / toddlers of both sexes in frocks.

Trimummy3 · 15/09/2019 10:11

Also those of us with intelligence, don’t need labels. My girls buy cars and dolls, my son often dresses up as Elsa or woody from toy story. We are not 100 percent into one type of thing. But sometimes my girls do play with dolls and that’s ok too.

Trimummy3 · 15/09/2019 10:13

How does Sam smith and others know that he feels “female” then? He doesn’t know what female feels like?! Surely he’s using gender stereotypes to construct this belief. He only THINKS he knows.

Twistables · 15/09/2019 10:13

My only question is: who are Sam Smith?

pottedshrimps · 15/09/2019 10:15

Bless.

It's a method of ensuring that people who believe they are very speshul so can make others treat them as very speshul and yoonique as well.

Look at me, it's all about me....me me me me me me

colourlessgreenidea · 15/09/2019 10:18

What a load of crap- gender has absolutely nothing to do with the above- those are gender stereotypes and liking pink and playing with dolls absolutely does not make you a girl!

Erm, you’ve massively misunderstood. Hmm

I presented a simplified set of examples of socially-constructed gendered tropes (i.e. ‘stereotypes’), as illustrations of ‘gender’ vs ‘biological sex’. Nowhere did I say that playing with dolls ‘made’ you a girl; I was clear that there were constructed tropes, not inherent characteristics.

I was quite clear that such tropes were socially constructed rather than inherent, so I’m struggling to see where your confusion sprang from.

If gender ‘has nothing to do’ with culturally gendered stereotypes, please could you explain what gender is, as you understand it?

Cocolapew · 15/09/2019 10:26

Prince changed his name to the symbol in rebellion against his record company, who he was in dispute with. Nothing to do with sex/gender/non binary shenanigans.

emilybrontescorsett · 15/09/2019 10:27

Bottom line.
He's not that interesting and does not have the flair to be Mick Hutchence, David Bowie, Annie Lennox, Hazel O'Connor etc.
The above had the x factor for want of a better word.
Mick Hutchence stood on stage and probably ever man ,woman and their dog would fall to their knees if they thought they had any chance of spending time alone with him. He oozed sex appeal.
The same cannot be said for Sam Smith.
So he and his fellow non descripts have to come with some other way to get people talking about them.
It sounds rude but it's true.
Mick Hutchence did not have to bleat "I'm so special me." Because he was special .

UnaCorda · 15/09/2019 10:28

In Swedish they came up with a new pronoun that can be used by non binaries, situations where gender is unknown or unnecessary.

We already have such a pronoun in English: "it".

Littlechocola · 15/09/2019 10:28

@MrsToddsShortcut I love your first post on this thread.

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