Brighton primary school admissions - gender identity

[SisterMoonshine]

I just caught the end of something on the radio about parents receiving letters this week to say which school their child has a place at. And that they should put which gender their child identifies with.
Big question!
I think I'd have to give an essay for an answer if this was our area. As far as DD is concerned, at 3, she is simply DD.

Yes, gender is a social construct
John money took a male child, with male hormones and a male body and tried to raise him as a girl. He was also sexually abusive to both boys. His failed experiment only proves that biological sex is a formative part of brain development through childhood and adolescence, and that if you sexually abuse children they will be very unhappy and may commit suicide.

Sexual orientation matters because it does
People are attracted to other people sexually because of their primary and secondary sexual characteristics. Lesbian women like Vulvas and breasts. So do heterosexual men etc. What does that have to do with gender identity?

sunburnt Fucking John Money, are you serious? The guy that forced intersex children into unwanted gender roles in his "experiments" and consequently fucked up their whole lives?

The guy who forced children to perform sex acts on one another as part of his "experiments" which would be considered illegal pedophilia in our country,

Are you seriously basing your ideas of "Gender" on this madman?

StepAwayFromTheThesaurus And your proof of this exists where? With the "American College of Paediatrics"? N.A.R.T.H.? Go on. Enlighten us all.

I thought gender was social practices. How else do you learn social practices other than through being socialised into them?

Oh Ophelia! Try to keep up. I wrote "That was evident after the failure of social experiment gender expert John Money's inflicted in the famous John/ Joan case."
The FAILURE of his case. Money posited that gender WAS a social construct. He was on your side of the fence.
How did the child know he was a boy despite years of directive behavioural therapy telling him otherwise, castration, oestrogen treatment. Read the kids life story. He fought what was imposed on him his whole life until at fourteen his father relented and told him the truth, that he was born a boy.
The kid knew all along he was a boy. So despite everything that happened, how did the kid KNOW he was a boy? And why did it matter to him that he was a boy? Huh?

Sunburnt, is it actually helpful to anything for you to be claiming posters are on the side of child abuse?

Nobody apart from you is claiming that child abuse is proof of anything.

There is an enormous body of research literature that very clearly establishes that gender (as distinct from biological sex) is a social construct, which has varied over time and differs between cultures in various ways. There is nothing innate in it because it's a concept that emerges as a result of social practices. If you'd like to research this for yourself, try your local university library.

I haven't cited the American College of Pediatricians for anything.

John Money was not on 'our side of the fence'. At all. His practices were dangerous and abusive and ultimately offered no 'proof' either way.

Sunburnt

How many types of gender identity are there, and how can I work out what my gender identity is? You're sure everyone has one?

Money was trying to force a binary gender onto intersex children, and force a binary gender role onto children against their will.

Money was mental and I would be seriously suspicious of anyone using his experiments to prove or disprove anything.

Sunburnt - re "We are all born with a gender identity"

Speak for yourself. I am no different than a man, except physically, and never have been.

"But if someone repeatedly says "he" and "him" to me I take offence. Why?"

No idea. Why do you?

If someone were to repeatedly say "he" while referring to me, I would think he is a bit blind or has some sort of cognitive problem.

"I know I'm a woman. And if someone tells me I look like a man, it stings. I get a jarring feeling. I take offence. I feel insulted."

Because you think it means you are ugly? Sorry, I really don't get it

"Try some empathy. Thats a scratch on the tip of the iceberg of what gender dysphoria feels like. Imagine walking around every day with that feeling as a kid in school and the fear of what might happen to you if you tell someone..."

If one day I find myself convinced that I am something that my eyes say I am obviously not (man, alien, lizard, cat, a toddler, etc), ridicule & ostracisation would be the least of my worries. I would be terrified that I have had a psychotic break.

Ophelia Money's experiment didn't prove anything. Once again, I didn't say that. I said it was the failure of his experiment, the failure of it and the lies he told about it, which opened up a whole debate about the perpetuation of this "gender is a social construct" myth.

And HairyLittlePoet It's accepted that gender, like sexuality and politics and colour and light, exists on a spectrum so identify anywhere you care to. Gender is not a binary. The binary is a social construct. The bible told me so.

Yes. Can you definitively outline the available (and real and innate) genders and list their characteristics? Is there a nice objective test I can apply to determine what my gender is?

Because, if it's actually a real thing, you will be able to precisely define it and the categories within it. If it's just a load of socially constructed nonsense, it will be wooly, variable and utterly impossible to properly distinguish between its subclasses (which gender very clearly is).

A flawed experiment (and that's putting it mildly) cannot do anything to prove or disprove anything. It's just a completely unethical waste of everyone's time.

CoteDAzur
You say, "I am no different than a man, except physically, and never have been."
Then a few sentences later,
"If one day I find myself convinced that I am something that my eyes say I am obviously not (man...) ridicule & ostracisation would be the least of my worries. I would be terrified that I have had a psychotic break."

So you're no different to a man, except physically? But you're not a man because you can see the bits that are different, like genitalia etc. And if you think you're a man you're psychotic even though you're no different to a man inside."

WOW!! High brow stuff this!!!

Not everyone has an innate 'gender identify', and forcing one on someone (who repeatedly tells you they don't have one) as the genderist lobby are so keen to do, is basically mis-gendering. A crime they describe as an act of violence.

Please stop telling women what they think and feel. It's misogyny.

Sunburnt, Iif gender is not a social construct, what is it? What is this thing called gender that you are talking about?

I don't think it is repulsive to keep going over the details of how a child was abused for no other reason than it 'opened up a whole debate.' You can have a debate without discussing the details of that poor kid.

Sorry, I mean that I don't think it is necessary. I certainly think it is repulsive.

StepAwayFromTheThesaurus So there are characteristics of gender now are there precisely defined into categories?
Ever heard of a process of self determination and self identification? Why would you need some "objective test" to really come to know yourself? Couldn't you rely on the data of your own intuition? How have you come to know yourself? Because of what people told you you were your whole life? Or because you know who you are?
(Or because of your test results?)

StepAwayFromTheThesaurus So there are characteristics of gender now are there precisely defined into categories?
Ever heard of a process of self determination and self identification? Why would you need some "objective test" to really come to know yourself? Couldn't you rely on the data of your own intuition? How have you come to know yourself? Because of what people told you you were your whole life? Or because you know who you are?
(Or because of your test results?)

femfortheday "The genderist lobby"? Gimme a break. What lobby are you operating within? The RadFem brigade?

"So you're no different to a man, except physically? But you're not a man because you can see the bits that are different, like genitalia etc. And if you think you're a man you're psychotic even though you're no different to a man inside."

Wow you really didn't get any of it, did you?

I am a woman because of my biology. There is nothing else that sets me apart from a man.

If one day I start to think I am a man (although I can clearly see that I am not), I would quickly seek professional help because that would mean my brain is lying to me. Yes, psychotic break could be a possibility. Or a brain tumour.

Was that really that hard to understand?

Yes, I'd like to self identify as a Royal King.
Yep. Think I'm going to go right ahead with that one.