To think that the vast majority of people do not feel they have a gender identity?

[Galvantulang]

My company has recently started suggesting that we can record our gender identity and preferred pronouns (these would be publicly displayed on the intranet) on our HR record system. It's optional for now, but almost everyone I asked at work when the email came out went "eh?".

Apart from the data protection issues of collecting all this extra information, AIBU to think that the majority of people don't consider themselves to have a gender identity, just their sex?

i.e. you don't identify as a man or woman, you just... are one?

Watching laws and amendments to bills being proposed (especially in Scotland) based on recognising gender identity rather than biological sex, seems somewhat unreal.

Um...

Yabu = I feel like I have a gender identity.
Yanbu = I do not feel like I have a gender identity.

[pumpkinbump]

@Northofsomewhere

Gender might not seem important to most of you judging by the poll but I bet the majority would be pretty unhappy to be called "sir" or "Mr" which is why getting the correct gender pronoun's is important to helping people feel included and respected. Obviously this is a simplistic view of gender and gendered pronoun's but it gets the point across as to why they matter.

It's obvious what pronouns are. I actually believe this does pose a problem to trans people too. By making a big deal of it, asking someone who is suffering gender dysphoria what their pronouns are is going to be triggering no?

[cinammonbuns]

Honestly I think in this constant (and exhausting) trans debate people have got themselves confused. If you refer to yourself as a women ever then clearly you believe in gender. I do not know anyone who refers to themselves only as a female not a woman but if you do then you can say you don’t believe in gender.

[ArabellaScott]

“Gender might not seem important to most of you judging by the poll but I bet the majority would be pretty unhappy to be called "sir" or "Mr"

Happens quite a lot, actually. I have an unusual name (and short hair). Doesn't bother me in the slightest.

[BlackForestCake]

I do have a very strong sense of being female regardless of what my sex is

Go on then. Other than your body, what is it that makes you female?

[YetAnotherSpartacus]

ink everyone is getting tied up in knots in a bid to hold onto the meaning of the word "sex". I'd like to return both meanings. My sex and my gender are female and woman 🤷🏻‍♀️

Except this is not what gender originally meant (or, at least, meant in second wave feminism). Gender pertained to the kinds of behaviours that denoted masculine or feminine. In second wave feminism the argument was that women were socialised to be feminine (and men masculine) and that these were not innate. As a descriptive term it was used to explain the gendering of males as masculine and girls as feminine and meant a lot to women who were told they were wrong or broken because they did not conform to gender stereotypes or who were sanctioned for their non-conformity.

[AnyOldPrion]

Who cares about being called Sir or Mr? I’d correct it and move on... or not bother because it’s unimportant in most contexts.

I don’t think I have one, but I don’t know whether it’s because I have no problems with my sex and identity. Could it be something you only feel if there is a mismatch?

What is this mismatch? Does this imply there’s some kind of feminine essence or soul in a man that makes him actually a woman?

[ErrolTheDragon]

lves confused. If you refer to yourself as a women ever then clearly you believe in gender.

No, it simply means you have the usual understanding of the word 'woman' which is an adult human, sex female.

[YetAnotherSpartacus]

Gender might not seem important to most of you judging by the poll but I bet the majority would be pretty unhappy to be called "sir" or "Mr"

Fuck. I’d hope for a pay rise.

[nevernotagain]

Im a women, but I don’t act like one I guess?? I don’t do make up and bitching and get scared to get dirty or muddy, but I’m not like a bloke either, I don’t fight, burp or fart aloud, play football or like sport. I just feel like myself, neither like a man or a women but just me.

What the fucking fuck does "But I don't act like one" mean?

I'm sooooo not like all the other girls

I don't have a gender. I'm a woman.

[ALittleBitofVitriol]

Yanbu.

From a quick Google
"Gender identity is the personal sense of one's own gender"
And
"Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to, and differentiating between, femininity and masculinity"

Please, can someone explain why any workplace needs to know which characteristics of masculinity or femininity I personally prefer?
Why is my personal sense of my feminine/masculine preferences a superior way to organise society, as opposed to reproductive classes?
Maybe we should just group by whether we're cat/dog/non-binary-pet people. 🙄

[TeddysTigerEyes]

I was born a woman. That’s my sex. I just am me, that’s all I can say really, I can’t identify as somebody else because I can only imagine how it feels to be them. So I have my own personal identity and my sex and I’m quite happy with them.

[FannyCann]

NHS - we have all had individual Covid risk assessments which start with your age, deduct 5 for being female as males are at higher risk, then add on various numbers for a range of factors such as race, BMI, health conditions.

And yet, EVERY time I log on to enter the result of my home lateral flow test the first question asked is my gender.

EVERY time I click on the "other" option and free text "Sex = female".
And from time to time I have a mini rant in the free text comment box at the end that if I identified as a man my personal Covid risk assessment would increase by five putting me in a higher risk group.

If it was high enough for me to be sent home to relax and catch up on my reading and Netflix shield I would seriously consider identifying as male.

[Ifyourefeelingsinister]

I don't feel as if I have a gender. Yes, social conditioning may mean I behave in ways traditionally associated with my sex, but this has nothing to do with any innate feeling. As far as I can see, gender is no different from personality. I accept others may believe in a feeling of gender, and that's fine for them, but please don't expect people to feel as if they have a gender that's distinct from their sex.

[aliloandabanana]

In the words of Tracy Barlow in Coronation Street: "I don't identify as a woman, I am a woman". It's getting ridiculous now - people are either male or female and how they feel is irrelevant.

[IWillSqueakAgain]

Gender is a nonsense term.

Gender= sex role stereotypes.

I don’t think any woman identifies with being submissive and an object of men. We simply don’t identify our way into oppression and we can’t identify our way out of it. It’s victim blaming to suggest we do.

We need to stop using the word gender as if it has any meaning, it doesn’t. Sex role stereotypes makes it much clearer what it is, and make it obvious to women that we don’t identify with those at all.

[Schoolchoicesucks]

I am happy for anyone who wants to share their pronouns, marital status, sexual orientation, height, dress size, number of children, age etc on their email signature or employee directory.

I would prefer not to share my personal information in that way. I don't think people should be persuaded to have to do it either.

[chestnutSquash]

@cinammonbuns

Honestly I think in this constant (and exhausting) trans debate people have got themselves confused. If you refer to yourself as a women ever then clearly you believe in gender. I do not know anyone who refers to themselves only as a female not a woman but if you do then you can say you don’t believe in gender.

That makes no sense.
Woman = adult human female.
Gender should be confined to French nouns.

[PrawnPower]

@YetAnotherSpartacus

ink everyone is getting tied up in knots in a bid to hold onto the meaning of the word "sex". I'd like to return both meanings. My sex and my gender are female and woman 🤷🏻‍♀️

Except this is not what gender originally meant (or, at least, meant in second wave feminism). Gender pertained to the kinds of behaviours that denoted masculine or feminine. In second wave feminism the argument was that women were socialised to be feminine (and men masculine) and that these were not innate. As a descriptive term it was used to explain the gendering of males as masculine and girls as feminine and meant a lot to women who were told they were wrong or broken because they did not conform to gender stereotypes or who were sanctioned for their non-conformity.

We're all sensible enough to understand that a woman is a woman whether or not she's a butch gun-toting naval officer (thinking of someone I know) or a high-heels and makeup kind of lady. Or anywhere in between.

Women are females and men are males. They mean the same thing fundamentally and the distinction is only really useful when discussing biology. It sounds strange to me to say "that female over there". That rings oddly in my ears as it's too medicalised.

Either way men are male, women are female. Express yourself however you like but that's a fact.

[ItsIgginningtolooklikelockdown]

@cinammonbuns

Honestly I think in this constant (and exhausting) trans debate people have got themselves confused. If you refer to yourself as a women ever then clearly you believe in gender. I do not know anyone who refers to themselves only as a female not a woman but if you do then you can say you don’t believe in gender.

Does this make no sense at all to anyone else?

[Floridaflipflops]

I feel like a female when I’ve washed my hair, put my face on and off out fir a night out.

Every other time I just feel like a slug.

[Norwayreally]

I don’t identify as anything. I’m a woman because I was born with a female reproductive system, I menstruate and I have given birth to five children.

[Melroses]

How do slugs feel?

[Quaagars]

@Northofsomewhere
Gender might not seem important to most of you judging by the poll but I bet the majority would be pretty unhappy to be called "sir" or "Mr" which is why getting the correct gender pronoun's is important to helping people feel included and respected.

Exactly, like saying it's Miss/Mrs, and someone just smirking and carrying on calling you Sir even after being "put right" as they think you can't possibly be or they think it's funny/going to do what they like anyway.

[ArabellaScott]

@Melroses

How do slugs feel?

slimy?

[PrawnPower]

@ItsIgginningtolooklikelockdown


@cinammonbuns
Honestly I think in this constant (and exhausting) trans debate people have got themselves confused. If you refer to yourself as a women ever then clearly you believe in gender. I do not know anyone who refers to themselves only as a female not a woman but if you do then you can say you don’t believe in gender.

Does this make no sense at all to anyone else?

Makes sense to me.

@cinammonbuns is saying to all those who say they don't believe in gender, you must never refer to yourselves as "women". Unless you only ever call yourself a "female" then you do buy into gender. And I agree and don't see the problem with it.

Woman = female. I'm not getting the confusion. What a women looks and acts like is entirely up to them. They're still a woman though, not something else or something new. And they're not solely a "female". My cat is female. I'm more than my sex class. I'm a human being. I'm a woman.