Can you all just lay off trans people

[cjferg]

There is a difference between sex and gender. Some people's align, other people's don't. Some people are biologically female, and their gender doesn't match that and vies versa. Some people don't have a gender. Why do you care so much?

One of my best friends in school was biologically a female. When he 'came out' to me as trans and explained how he had never felt comfortable in his body all I thought (and anyone who knew him) was that I wasn't surprised and that it made a lot of sense and we all got on with our lives. This was about age 17 and he said he had known this since he was a kid (not saying that any kid who says they want to should be able to willy nilly block their hormones, etc, btw)
It wasn't just about 'presenting as a male'. He was actually a male in a female body.
Yes, when he started presenting as male he felt a lot better. I remember he didn't want to go to our prom because of all the dressing up, etc. until we suggested he wear a tux, and it was amazing to see him so comfortable.
But still he hated having tits and having to wear a binder (can be done safely if you get a proper binder and don't just use bandages or w/e so don't even start)
It wasn't enough to just stuff the front of the trousers.
I repeat, he was a man trapped in a woman's body. Not just a cross dressing woman, not just in an experimental phase.

I have another friend who is biologically a female but they don't have a gender. They are known as 'they' not 'he'or 'she' and knowing them you would in no way think that they are either male or female, again not just about looking a certain way.

I also see a lot of people on here ranting about trans people and they literally only care about transwomen. Genuinely, what has happend to you that you feel so threatened at the thought of someone with a penis being the same gender as you?

Stop ranting about how men are going to use it as an excuse to perv on your kid in a changing room. I'd bet quite a lot that more women will perv on your kid in a changing room than men pretending to be trans will.

Gender is evolving all the time there are no definitive rules to being a man or a woman.

For every thing that you think being a woman is, there will be a woman who disagrees with you.
You say that being a woman means having a uterus - does that make people who've had theirs removed for medical reasons not women?

If being a woman means the ability to have babies then does that mean infertile women aren't women?

If you think being a man is the ability to grow facial hair does that mean that men who can't aren't men?

I read about a woman who had poly cystic ovaries and had a luxurious, thick beard and moustache as a result. Does that mean she is a man or less of a woman? Or should she have continued to try and shave and wax it off and be ashamed of it rather than accept herself the way she was and rock the beard?

Seriously, we've come a long way from being a woman meaning you're your husband's property and having to squirt out babies and clean your whole life. Why are you so determined to go backwards?

Stop using the teeny possibility of a man pretending to be trans to invade women's spaces as a vehicle for your hatred and open your mind enough to at least try and understand the issue, because it might be your kid. It might be your dad. It might be your bff 4eva. If that were the case would you ostracise them from your life and declare them a fraud, or have a little empathy and try and support them through something potentially life changing.

drops mic

Nope, 'fraid it's not Lang, it's rather "done feminists are determined that they know best about something that has been acknowledged and discussed FOR CENTURIES because they've bought into some reductionist logical fallacy".

People have bodies. People exist within social constructs. People also have minds.

I'm not talking crazy stuff here.

Done = some

Not to worry, Sally. Lots of people are opposed to women's liberation, and in fact that is the very matter under discussion. Women being secure in their person. Though I dare say that word, pander, does not mean what you think it means.

How does one become 'more woman'? Surely you are either a woman or a man?

Do you mean more feminine? As in a walking stereotype of make-up, hair extensions and padded bras? That doesn't make you more woman, it just makes you feminine.

I gotta say the mic drop bit signaling #nodebate really is out of place, authoritarian and rude, on a talk forum, OP.

Just like the dollar bill, face tattoos, strappy dresses, neck rings and lip plates have no sense of self.

The author is not comparing people with dollar bills, she(?) is comparing the trappings of gender with dollar bills.

Sex, and sex organs, have existed for bajillionty years before conscious organisms with a sense of self evolved. Even plants have them.

All social constructs exist within minds and are 'real' inasmuch as they have real world effects. Money is both real and a social construct. So is gender. But they get their reality from the shared meanings we give them, not from the physical stuff they are made from or the way they physically function.

I don’t give a shit who anyone wants to be, as long they aren’t an arsehole I’m not bothered. I am sure if people want to perv they’ll watch on a beach, pool from a far etc.

Pests are male and female, also in a changing room I’d be locked away because I wouldn’t get changed in front of anyone male or female.

If you are happy to go out in public and be who you want to be even if you know you’re going to be judged I rate you and I got your back because if I saw anyone picking on another for being themselves I’d give you a mouthful.

Hi pencils, you're right that the angle the I'm coming at this from is different from the angle intended by the author. I just wrote a long reply picking up on your points but then deleted it because my intention is not to debate the intention of the"rightness" of the author (although I think they've conflated various issues); moreover I wanted to use it as a opener to where I think the big difference in perspective is coming from.

Hang on, I'll take your latest post...

@RatRolyPoly I think PencilsInSpace has answered the question better than I could ever hope to do.

However, to add my 2p worth. I think gender doesn't define us and indeed it should not.

But being part of a biological sex class does have a material reality. If I am part of the sex class whose bodies can usually produces eggs not sperm, I cannot biologically be a father.

If I am part of the sex class whose bodies can usually produce eggs I may, under the right conditions, become a mother.

If society says that father's take their sons to football, and mothers their daughters to the beautify parlour. That is stereotypical idea based on stereotypes of sex, which our society calls gender.

It can be challenged.

I can take my son to the football and the beauty parlour. I can take my daughter to football and the beauty parlour.

Because ideas about wjo likes football and who likes beauty parlours are socially constricted and can change. (Neither of my kids like either!)

But who belongs to a sex class that produces sperm or eggs is biology, and applies to the animal kingdom (who have need of neither football or beauty parlours) and that is not socially constructed.

I can see that finding 'gender stereotypes' appealing could be because a male just likes some things associated with females (and vice versa) or because a person feels naturally incminded to the opposite sex and so wishes to 'buy into' things society associates with that thing. The former may be very happy to be gender non-confirming, the later may want to identify as trans.

Does that agree with your statements @PencilsInSpace ?

I am all woman though, much more than woman than every single feminist that I have met.

What does this even mean? I'm a feminist, i was born with XX chromosomes, oh, and I use female pronouns.

What do you have/do that makes you "more" woman than me?

Naturally inclined... I mean

Just like the dollar bill, face tattoos, strappy dresses, neck rings and lip plates have no sense of self.

No they do not. We know them as gender. Some people (me) think there is something internal - within the mind - that we also know as "gender". But they are not the same thing. And the social construct is not the ONLY gender.

The author is not comparing people with dollar bills, she(?) is comparing the trappings of gender with dollar bills.

Sex, and sex organs, have existed for bajillionty years before conscious organisms with a sense of self evolved. Even plants have them.

Yep, sex is sex is sex, plants have organs which have a sex; they don't have a "sense of self", but equally they don't appear to have genders. Best not to get sidetracked by this though as I suspect it's by the by. Sex is sex, we agree

All social constructs exist within minds

I don't think that's right; social constructs are recognisable phenoma, they do not "exist within minds" in any sense other than that we know about them! Social constructs are external phenomena.

Money is both real and a social construct.

The word "money" refers to both the physical object AND the social construct.

So is gender.

The word gender refers to both the social construct AND the state within the mind.

But they get their reality from the shared meanings we give them, not from the physical stuff they are made from or the way they physically function.

The external social constructs of gender get their reality from the meanings we give them.

The internal sense of one's gender gets it's reality from simply being real and present as an experience within the mind. As is the case with ALL things within the mind.

Larrygylls Thank you for your links, I will give them a read. There is so much to read and such little time. I do try to be open-minded but I find with questions surrounding sex and gender no matter how much research is done it is always those who are arguing against the orthodoxy that women are inferior by biology to men that are asked to be open-minded. No matter how many years or how widely I read unless I agree with the orthodox position I must see this or that.

The same happens across academia, look at the way Prof. Beard is treated, her expertise in her subject is disregarded for the mere fact that she is a woman. It is the same in my subject.

Your statement that ‘most scientists agree’ leads to my next point which is significant when it comes to research. I’m unsure of your university position and apologise if I am teaching my grandmother to suck eggs so to speak. Funding restrictions mean that external forces dictate the questions which can be asked. Also, the REF means that the University places extreme pressure of output and impact on academics thus if one does research into an area which the press will write articles about, normally that which supports a dominant worldview, it is good for the REF and therefore supported by the University. It is these boring practicalities of research which skew what is being asked and thus what is being found, not a conspiracy theory.
The sex of the authors is of little matter regarding whether a work upholds, or seeks to uphold, sexist principles. Women can be just as sexist as men. Also, our positions are just as, if not more precarious, and we are working in a world which still seeks to underpin and support male privilege. Alongside this, we too have experienced a life of grooming into these ideas and structures.
With the toxic atmosphere surrounding gender at the moment I feel it is important to acknowledge that scholars who support gender ideology can draw extra authority from their institutions whereas dissenting voices must remain anonymous.

"plants have organs which have a sex....they don't appear to have genders"

Some may disagree, rat...

Daily

Well I have a more feminine outlook. I dress like a woman, talk like a woman, think and feel like a woman.

Far too many feminists emulating men and masculinity out there.

I have done very well as a woman, it has helped that my man is a real man and we both respect each other's roles.

How do YOU relate to feminists? Genuine curiosity.....

Hi Italiangreyhound, for the most part we agree!

I think gender doesn't define us and indeed it should not.

I think the external social construct of gender should not define us. I don't let it define me, in fact I revel in defying it :D

But being part of a biological sex class does have a material reality.

It does; sex it a way of classifying a particular physical reality. It's immutable, I agree.

If society says that father's take their sons to football, and mothers their daughters to the beautify parlour. That is stereotypical idea based on stereotypes of sex, which our society calls gender.

What I'm putting to you is that yes, our society calls stereotypes based on sex "gender", but that there is another thing that is a part of one's internal "sense of self" that is ALSO called "gender".

So you can be of the biological sex of female, have a sense of yourself as a woman, and defy "woman" stereotypes. BUT there is also the possibility - as evidenced by hundreds of thousands of trans people worldwide - that you can be of the biological sex of female, defy the stereotypes of "woman", but ALSO be very sure of yourself as a man. A very real, very palpable sense of self which is distinct from the question of social constructs.

(Disclaimer: not saying all trans people feel this way)

Lol Beyond

The difference would of course come if that tree were a conscious being and TOLD you it was a woman

Ugh, it's so unhelpful that we only have our existing lexicon to discuss this. We need two different words for gender and other gender-related terms. Oh well, the reality always comes before the words, I'm sure things will catch up.

I am all woman though, much more than woman than every single feminist that I have met

This means: i perform femininity better than every single feminist I have ever met.

Pp, you are talking about gender, not sex. Feminists are less likely to be interested in performing stereotyped gender roles (which of course you can do more or less well) and more likely to think of a woman as someone who is female, full stop.

"I read about a woman who had poly cystic ovaries and had a luxurious, thick beard and moustache as a result."

You have just compared trans women to a woman with a medical abnormality, implying trans women also suffer from medical abnormalities. I dare you to suggest that to trans activists and see what happens. Good luck to you if you do.

I wrote the above as my reply to OP, I now quickly skimmed the thread. A single OP and not returning once in 13 pages so far, but over 300 replies. Kudos OP.

think and feel like a woman.

What does this mean? Genuinely asking. I am a woman, therefore surely however I think and feel is a way that a woman can think and feel. Is there a more woman-ish way to be thinking and feeling? And if there is, why is my woman brain not doing it automatically?

"drops mic

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

That's the bestestestestest (and another est) bit of undeserved self-congratulation I've ever seen.

Thanks, OP, you've right cheered me up."

Written by Lily Madigan perhaps?

Not RTFT did OP never post again?

Italiangreyhound - Does that agree with your statements? Yes

RatRolyPoly if you want to argue for gender as something within the mind, separate from socially constructed gender, this article is probably not the best place to start.

I don't think that's right; social constructs are recognisable phenoma, they do not "exist within minds" in any sense other than that we know about them! Social constructs are external phenomena.

They are invented by minds (many minds, collectively) and if you remove people (minds) from the situation, social constructs cease to function. As the author says, Another way to test if something is a social construct is to remove people from the picture entirely and see if it retains its functionality. Without people to give a dollar meaning it simply becomes paper.

The word "money" refers to both the physical object AND the social construct.
The word gender refers to both the social construct AND the state within the mind.

This is muddled. As I said, if you want to argue for gender being a state of mind, this article and the examples it uses are not the best place to start. I would maybe say:

The word "money" refers to both the physical object AND the social construct.
(yet taken out of a context where it is legal tender, the dollar bill is no longer money but simply a piece of paper)

The word gender refers to both the physical trappings AND the social construct.
(yet taken out of a context where a giant lip plate signifies femininity, it becomes simply a giant lip plate)

The internal sense of one's gender gets it's reality from simply being real and present as an experience within the mind. As is the case with ALL things within the mind.

You could have saved a lot of time by simply saying 'I believe in gender as an internal mental reality' and not trying to bounce off this article at all.

Personally I don't believe in gender in that sense. I don't experience it myself and have never heard a convincing description that didn't rely on gender stereotypes or reference the physical sexed body. I'm happy to accept that other people might experience an internal sense of gender in some indescribable way, just as some people have a deep sense that god exists.

It's not reasonable though to insist that everybody else believes in it too, or to base laws around something so subjective.