Defining Gender

[MsBeaujangles]

I am starting a new thread that I hope will be a single issue thread that focuses on definitions of 'man' and 'woman' for those that describe themselves as such because of their identity rather than biology.

I know that there are lots of important and related issues to discuss in relation to this, but these are covered in other threads and attempts to explore this often gets lost. It is often said that this is because there is no definition that works, but perhaps this thread might encourage those that view transmen/transwoman as men/woman to discuss this on this thread.

The sooner we have a definition to work with, the sooner we can start to address concerns from both sides about spaces, gender stereotyping etc.

I know that threads have a life of their own, but I really hope that this one can stick to definitions. Even if it means it has few posts!

I haven't found any official documents in the NHS yet (quite a few things have the NHS logo but are put out by other groups) but if you're looking for official definitions that may influence policy makers, here are the ones from the WHO:

Sex: The different biological and physiological characteristics of males and females, such as reproductive organs, chromosomes, hormones, etc.

Gender: Refers to the socially constructed characteristics of women and men – such as norms, roles and relationships of and between groups of women and men. It varies from society to society and can be changed. The concept of gender includes five important elements: relational, hierarchical, historical, contextual and institutional. While most people are born either male or female, they are taught appropriate norms and behaviours – including how they should interact with others of the same or opposite sex within households, communities and work places. When individuals or groups do not “fit” established gender norms they often face stigma, discriminatory practices or social exclusion – all of which adversely affect health.

Source: WHO, Gender mainstreaming for health managers: a practical approach, 2011. There are other sex and gender policy terms in the World Health World Health Organization Glossary of Gender, equity and human rights.

In terms of using man and woman for GNC people...in discussions I've had with other detransitioned people as well as those still on hormones - particularly those that are female, it's typically something like "a man is someone who is seen and treated as an adult human male" and "a woman is someone who is seen and treated as an adult human female" partially in recognition of the social aspects on gender being applied to sex and partially in response to some who once on hormones and were regularly passing as a man that their experiences and treatment were different and felt that helped them discuss issues with limitations in language. This doesn't have much to do with current policy makers (though some would like it to...) but it is the thinking and language of a not small part of the GNC community which as a psychologist you might be interested in.

That's interesting @dn4 because "seen" and "treated as" are two very different things aren't they? Each has its own issues wrt trans.

I think the OPs question is at the heart of the issue, as feminists have long argued. Meaningful definitions and common understandings are central when making law.

The more I think about it the stranger it is that the words "man" and "woman" are being stretched like this. We don't try to redefine the word "cat" because some people believe they are really cats. We don't insist on their right to be treated by a Vet not a doctor - and we would rightly invoke legal action against any of them trying to mate with a real cat.

The belief that there are physical bodies with separate souls / personalities which enter into them at birth is a deeply religious belief. When you include animal souls into the mix then you are usually moving East and assuming reincarnation. That kind of mind body dualism is a real throw back. It baffles me that otherwise intelligent people can accept the "born in the wrong body" story. But then again, I did, until reading these threads on MN and started really thinking through the logic (lack of)

@Datun and DN4. Your replies combine the issues I am grappling with!

I think we need a term to describe the category of biological females (I empathise with those for whom writing this will invoke outrage because such a term already exists. I am trying to step outside that bit for now in order to grapple with issues about definitions).

I am conflicted about a term to describe the category of those who identify as women or want to be treated as women (natal woman or not) because I am in favour of all people being treated as people, not according to gender stereotypes. However, there are many natal women and men that do not object to this and I can’t see this changing. I no more oppose trans people associating themselves with such a label/category than I do the notion of creating such categories.

Therefore, so long as categories exist in relation to gender stereotypes, I don’t care who signs up to which label or category.

My ideal solution would be to have a term that addressed sex and a term that addressed social norms/expectations. I think this would help society to be more aware of gender roles etc and it would help GNC people to be more widely accepted.
It would help me because I could just go with the biological category and opt out of others.

Whilst this is not how language typically develops/evolves, if this was introduced in policy/public practice, it could give us a framework for navigating some of the other issues.

I don’t think it would be popular with trans activists who want to deny biology or feminists who want to reject gender, but i think it could provide a starting point to navigate the issues the absence of clearly defined terms is creating.

My ideal solution would be to have a term that addressed sex and a term that addressed social norms/expectations.

Isn't this female/male and feminine/masculine?

Grammar isn’t my strong point but my understanding is that feminine and masculine are adjectives and a noun is needed so that the category has a name.

So you have feminine / masculine men / women.

I hope this is not derailing, but don’t want to start a new thread. Can someone clarify this for me, please? I thought I was clear on this, but someone has just been arguing with me.

So, biological = sex

Boy, man, male
Girl, woman, female

Gender

Masculine
Feminine

The person was trying to tell me that boy/girl are gender terms not sex terms. Who is right?

Though isn't the point that gender critical feminists are rejecting turning feminine and masculine into a noun because we don't believe that it's an objective thing in the first place that someone can be outside of sex - the noun is woman / man / person and you can perform "masculinely" or "femininely" to whatever degree. Not sure whether I've explained that very well, I sort of know what I mean!

Sorry I didn't type that very clearly:

The nouns are male / female man /woman boy / girl

The (problematic) descriptors could be masculine / feminine

Problematic because gender is not a real thing.

We're all cart before horse here.

1. Observe
2. Describe
3. Label

That's the order. Language doesn't invent words first and then contrive to invent a definition that feels right second.

Words are labels for concepts we already understand. The concept comes first, the label is just a short noise to convey that concept.
Eg White fluffy clouds with legs eating grass? Let's call em 'sheep' as shorthand.
NOT
sheep. What definition do we think we should come up with, hmm, think, think...

language evolves, but never to artificially combine two contradictory ideas that can't coexist. We don't sit around puzzling how to word the ideal definition of sheep that still conveys white fluffy cloud legged animals and ALSO would allow us to include snakes too.

Words are shorthand for a concept we already understand.
We understand the two different sexes before we have the words to label them. We understand they exist even WITHOUT words to helpfully label them. They are easily understood concepts.

I always feel bait and switch is the trick being played with language in discussions of gender.

Take a concept we all understand clearly, a tangible thing like humans who have vaginas, ovaries, XX chromosomes etc. No one disputes these people exist, they are recognisable, distinct from the rest of the humans.
Label this concept clearly. Female. Everyone on the same page so far.
Switch. Deny that the word female in fact DOES convey what it was invented to do. Mass confusion with communication now, chaos whilst people struggle to refer back to the original concept. No language exists to convey the vagina XX etc people as easily as we once could.

That's the aim of the lobbying over language. Preventing a label for a concept that still exists. If you can stop people mentioning females entirely, you can paralyse any action that would refer to that group.

It's the moral equivalent of owning slaves, yet declaring that slavery has been abolished because you've changed the definition of the word slave.
The slaves still exist but without the label needed to convey who they are, it's a hell of a lot harder to talk about or identify who they are.

The endgame for transactivists does NOT include clear definitions to allow us to communicate concepts easily. It is the opposite. The harder we try to pin down definitions, the faster they unpick them. The ideology depends upon confusion of concepts. It needs female to NEITHER mean XX, vagina etc NOR braintype characterised as. It needs female to become indefinable and constantly changing so that it can include/exclude as needed and in a nonsensical or contradictory manner.
The endgame is to 'own the slaves' so to speak, but ensure no one has the language to call them out on it.

It is very difficult to legislate without definitions, nearly impossible. Mostly it is broad brushed under religious liberty.
Transitioning is a faith based belief held by some people similar to transubstantiation in the Eucharist ritual. For some people it is a symbol while for others it is an article of faith.

Transubstantiation is an excellent parallel.

@pricklyball thank you for that wonderful post re uses of the word “gender”

And you know people, this stuff is serious. If I said publicly that transwomen (without a GRC) we’re not women, I could lose my job.

were not we’re

BarrackerBarmer

Excellent post. And actually cuts to the heart of it. If this definition of words is something that needs to be agreed upon by both feminists and transactivists, we’re fucked.

Because, you are quite right when you say they don’t want an agreed definition.

I predict that it will be cis women and women. And then, as you rightly point out, because the concept is the issue, not the word used to describe it, cis women will be the one they come after next.

They will be constantly chasing us down because it’s the concept that they want.

For the authoritarian trans advocates I think it is pretty clearly about obedience. For the AGPs it is the ultimate male dominance display.

I feel sorry for secondary school biology teachers - how do they navigate through this stuff? Or are they safe as they can talk from a purely scientific perspective?

Interesting question, Cloud. I remember when I was an undergrad (still at the end of the cold war back then) there was a widely held belief that one of the reasons the USSR produced so many brilliant physicists and mathematicians was that those were parts of science which couldn't be politicised, so very bright people with a scientific bent went into those in preference for, say, biology (official Soviet orthodoxy was that Lysenko was right and Darwin was wrong, for instance), because maths and physics gave you a safe place to think without threat of persecution.

Authoritarianism - any sort of authoritarianism, left wing, right wing, transactivist, religious - is the enemy of free enquiry.

@BarrackerBarmer. Whatever the motivations of transactivists and what typically happens with the evolution of language, we find ourselves in a position where there is a turf war (excuse the pun) over the word 'woman'.
My preference, for reasons well rehearsed on this board, would be for terms to be in use that differentiate males and females by biology and to not have terms that condone (often out of conscious awareness) gender stereotyping. However, I would concede this latter desire in order to preserve clear differentiation according to biology. I also think that if we had terms that referred to gender identification/ stereotyping only, I think this would (gradually) lead people to be more conscious of, and question, social constructions.
If these terms were initially used in policy, medicine, therapy and public institutions they would probably gradually seep into mainstream culture.

@CloudNinetyNine.
I think the science curriculum is a safe place for teachers and is also a positive point of leverage. I know of a school who managed to get a charitable organisation to 'back off' with their mad demands by saying that they would not send letter out that directly conflicted with the curriculum. The charity were jumping up and down about the wording of a letter about parental consent for the HPV vaccine.
The government is not going to change the science curriculum and examination boards will not compromise on scientific truths.
There are transgender children in schools and they do need a lot of support and understanding. I really think that the use of definitions that will acknowledge that they do not want to be classified male/female on a day to day basis would be helpful

MsBeaujangles wrote - "I also think that if we had terms that referred to gender identification/ stereotyping only, I think this would (gradually) lead people to be more conscious of, and question, social constructions.
If these terms were initially used in policy, medicine, therapy and public institutions they would probably gradually seep into mainstream culture."

I think the word "transwoman" (in which trans is an integal part of the noun) already refers to gender identification / stereotyping only. Transactivists are currently succeeding in their aim of erasing this word from the English language, initially replacing it with "trans woman" (in which trans is an adjective instead of a noun) and more recently replacing it with "woman". So, words that refer to gender identification / stereotyping only are being removed from mainstream culture rather than seeping into mainstream culture.

The problem with the ‘trans’ bit is, as I see it, it refers to natal sex.
Would a good middle ground be a term that people opt in to regardless of sex?
I don’t identify with a gender (as I am gender critical) and so sex only terms work for me.

Primary school children are being taught to celebrate transitioning by the mermaids organization and university professors are being reported as transphobic for teaching science. This is happening now.

But, MsB, most trans identified people don't want to be referred to as anything but the terms which refer specifically to biology, woman or man, with no distinctions. It is about validation. My FtM nephew and their mates consistently refer to themselves and each other as males (dude, bro, man), and insist they are in fact young men. They might occasionally make reference to 'being trans' for explanatory purposes, but always with trans as an adjective with a space before 'man'.
I can see what you are getting at, but in my experience, you are not going to achieve your objective because whatever terms you arrive at will be of no interest to a large group of people, and will be considered exclusionary and offensive. Only 'man' and 'woman' will do.

"You are a slow learner, Winston."
"How can I help it? How can I help but see what is in front of my eyes? Two and two are four."
"Sometimes, Winston. Sometimes they are five. Sometimes they are three. Sometimes they are all of them at once. You must try harder. It is not easy to become sane.”
― George Orwell, 1984

"Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.”
― George Orwell, 1984