"We can know the baby's sex but not its gender"

[Rumplestrumpet]

Hi all, I'm feeling a bit dim on this but know it's a sensitive subject so didn't want to ask IRL ....

I was chatting to a colleague about her pregnancy and asked if she knows whether it's a boy or girl. She said she didn't want to find out because it doesn't matter. I agreed - saying of course a baby is a baby and who cares what sex it is. But she explained "Well anyway we can only know its sex, but not its gender". Someone else nodded in agreement and I just kept quiet... But honestly I have no idea what this means.

I personally am critical of the idea that your sex has to define you, and hate the sexist stereotypes people fall for with small children ("boys will be boys" and all that nonsense). But it didn't sound like she meant this.

What would you understand by this?

Fwiw she's in her 20s and I'm an old fogey now so it may be a generational thing

She sounds confused. She is saying that sex is different than gender, correct, but then says that she doesn’t yet know what set of cultural and societal sex stereotypes her baby with adhere to. Who cares and news flash, babies don’t know about sex stereotypes in their particular culture yet. These are imposed. The baby may grow up not to need a label because they are a girl and like blue god forbid.

I will never understand the GC feminist on here. Surely she is saying exactly what is correct. She can only find out the sex of her child not the gender because gender is a social construct. Genuinely confused why people are calling her ‘woke’ for that. I simply will have to conclude what is increasingly obvious which is that ‘woke’ is code word for ‘I don’t agree with them.’ And that GC seem to not be very coherent about what gender actual is.

What would you understand by this?

I’d would understand that this wasn’t someone I’d want to spend much time with. I feel sorry for her child. If it’s a girl who dares to kick a football or a boy who plays with dolls, she of he will be shipped off for puberty blockers and hormones.

@DeathByWalkies

Sex is the bit involving chromosomes, genetalia and so on.

Gender is much more nuanced, and includes identity ("I'm a woman") and expression (I dress in a broadly feminine manner)

For most people, their sex and gender correlate, but not for everyone (non-binary people, trans people and so on).

What do you mean by 'correlate'? If I am female (sex) and I identify as a woman (gender?) does that correlate? If so, why - how, specifically, does 'female' and 'woman' overlap?

If what she meant was that no one will know the gender until the child learns to talk and then tells everyone what their gender is, I'm surprised she thought that needed to be spelled out. It's not as though OP was expecting the fetus to hold up a sign saying "I identify as female!" and wave it around for the sonogram.

She sounds bloody tedious, whatever she meant

That diagram..... "sex assigned at birth". Yup, just how it works. Midwife pulls a ticket out of a hat.

And what about people who reject the concept of "gender" entirely, @DeathByWalkies?

Gender is much more nuanced, and includes identity ("I'm a woman") and expression (I dress in a broadly feminine manner)

I guess I'm half and half then.
I know I'm a woman.
But feminine? Not so much...

Do GC believe gender doesn’t exist. If so I don’t really see what is wrong with what the OP’s colleague said. She didn’t mention stereotypes at all, it was OP who did .

@rainyskylight

Infuriating. All this gender indentity politics just reinforces gender cliches. The implication in what she is saying (if she did know the sex) is that “my baby’s sex is female but actually her gender is male because she prefers dinosaurs to dolls”. Rather than “my baby is a little girl and she likes a variety of toys”.

Yes!!!! Exactly.

@DeathByWalkies

Sex is the bit involving chromosomes, genetalia and so on.

Gender is much more nuanced, and includes identity ("I'm a woman") and expression (I dress in a broadly feminine manner)

For most people, their sex and gender correlate, but not for everyone (non-binary people, trans people and so on).

Gender isn’t nuanced.

Having a ‘nuanced gender’ used to be called ‘having a personality’. Now we apparently need operations and prescriptions to bring that personality into line with our biology.

What a world we’re living in.

I find all this very odd tbh. Personally I liked dressing up my daughter in pink etc.
I was also a bit of a tomboy myself, loved playing in mud, climbing trees and riding bikes well into my teens.
I had days where I wanted to dress up looking nice and days where I couldn't care less, depending on my mood.
Was never one to just stand around gossiping like most of my female friends seemed to enjoy.
From that I learnt that I was who I was, did not need to conform to any sort of way. Everyone feels differently and should according to how they feel.
There should be no pressure to act a certain way.
I feel like some people now actually go to the other end of spectrum just to prove they are " woke" so no pinks definitely for girls or blues for boys etc and everything gender neutral. As in the way you speak to them,dress them and their toys etc. It has become so contrived.
Let things progress naturally, let them enjoy whatever they want, go with the flow.
I personally would not keep telling them about the difference in gender etc, trying to reinforce different opinions as this is confusing them even more.
Some things are better left unsaid.

Sex and gender do mean different things - but here I think she was just being a twat.

When I had my first - annoyingly everything was put down to her being a girl, when I had a boy everything was down to him being a boy, when I had my thrid another girl very much her own person and personality everyone finally shut the fuck up.

Maybe she was trying to avoid that ?- though we tried and IME everyone pushes gendered shit at you and then they start school which often seems to reinforce gender sterotype roles - and you really have to push backk at home and point out the wider world and then tehy start secondary and everything gets more fucking sinister.

@cinammonbuns

Do GC believe gender doesn’t exist. If so I don’t really see what is wrong with what the OP’s colleague said. She didn’t mention stereotypes at all, it was OP who did .

The implication was that the child's gender identity would become apparent.

Which insinuates they'd know if it's boy or girl according to how they liked to play and dress.

As opposed to they can be either and play with anything and like any style of dress.

One option can lead to lifelong medical intervention (though of course not always) the other just means you don't fit into society's neat little boxes.

OP, you're asking this question on a board where someone would post that their MiL punched them during their "gender reveal party", should they go NC, and there would be loads of one-liner replies saying "It's sex not gender". I'm amazed you've not come across it yet!

She's being PC and thinks she's dead clever.

Actually I think she’s being the opposite of PC or woke. Acknowledging that sex is a biological fact is not PC at all.

'd be interested to know how one does find out one's gender though?

Either it's the gender that naturally match your sex..

or sadly, it's the one that your parents push on you and force you to be girly when you were supposed to be a boy, or force you to be boyish when you were supposed to be a girl.
It's very sad.

Having a ‘nuanced gender’ used to be called ‘having a personality’.

I love this, says it all really.

Dear god. The Mermaids gingerbread man

@kindaclassy

'd be interested to know how one does find out one's gender though?

Either it's the gender that naturally match your sex..

or sadly, it's the one that your parents push on you and force you to be girly when you were supposed to be a boy, or force you to be boyish when you were supposed to be a girl.
It's very sad.

OK, so what do you mean by 'match' your sex? If I am female (sex) and I identify as a woman (gender?) does that match? If so, why - how, specifically, does 'female' and 'woman' overlap?

What do you mean by 'girly'? Isn't literally anything a girl does 'girly' by definition?

Please if you don't know the answer to these questions just say so, But people come here and talk about matching/correlating sex and gender without explaining specifically what it means and it ends up confusing for people trying to understand.

@Summerleaves

Gender is much more nuanced, and includes identity ("I'm a woman") and expression (I dress in a broadly feminine manner)

I guess I'm half and half then.
I know I'm a woman.
But feminine? Not so much...

I was thinking the same things, some days feminine some days not

supposed to be a boy,

Oh dear god

@Rumplestrumpet

Hi all, I'm feeling a bit dim on this but know it's a sensitive subject so didn't want to ask IRL ....

I was chatting to a colleague about her pregnancy and asked if she knows whether it's a boy or girl. She said she didn't want to find out because it doesn't matter. I agreed - saying of course a baby is a baby and who cares what sex it is. But she explained "Well anyway we can only know its sex, but not its gender". Someone else nodded in agreement and I just kept quiet... But honestly I have no idea what this means.

I personally am critical of the idea that your sex has to define you, and hate the sexist stereotypes people fall for with small children ("boys will be boys" and all that nonsense). But it didn't sound like she meant this.

What would you understand by this?

Fwiw she's in her 20s and I'm an old fogey now so it may be a generational thing

@Summerleaves OP’s colleague said she can’t know it’s gender only it’s sex. She doesn’t seem to imply at all that she would know the baby’s gender anytime in the future.

@Summerleaves

Gender is much more nuanced, and includes identity ("I'm a woman") and expression (I dress in a broadly feminine manner)

I guess I'm half and half then.
I know I'm a woman.
But feminine? Not so much...

Less half and half, more a spectrum.

Your identity is as a woman.

You can still have a gender expression that could be described as androgynous, tomboy, butch etc etc etc. It doesn't mean you're any less of a woman.