Help me get my ducks in a row here...

[GCSciFiFan]

Ok so I seem to have some friends (who I thought had more brains but hey ho) who believe that because Alice Roberts says there's more than two sexes it must be true.

Anyway - I'm happy with the definition of your sex being to do with your reproductive class...but I can see a glaring hole in that one that she will find and I don't know an answer that will work....

If you are a woman because you are of the class of people who produce large, stationary gametes, how do you know you are a member of that class if you don't produce them (ie are infertile)? Why doesn't your class change (if we use that definition) if you have your ovaries removed?

How do you then say that "you are still a member of that class even though your biology is broken" without opening that up to men saying that they are actually a member of that class just with more badly broken biology?

(And no, I'm not saying infertile women aren't women - I'm preparing an answer to the argument).

My worry with this is that you are a member of that class because either it's blindingly obvious in the same way as the fact you are human is blindingly obvious - or we are back to a woman is someone without a Y chromosome (Do I mean a working SRY region on the Y chromosome here?) - at which point why use the reproductive class argument?

Then you get into the "but scientists say that it's more complicated than just chromosomes"...and I'll end up where we started. Plus she will then bring up sex-changing fish (apparently birds and mammals are unusual in having their sex linked to chromosomes rather than other factors - I checked) and will use the "if fish can do it then scientists in the future will be able to make humans do it - you'd never have predicted IVF etc" argument....

On a slight tangent does anyone know of anywhere in the world that has a useable, non-circular legal definition of sex?

Humans are not fish.

Intersex is best described as Difference of Sexual Development as people are not 'between sexes'.

A woman without the ability to reproduce is not a man. (A woman who chooses not to have children, therefore not using her gametes, is a man?)

If a male skeleton is found buried in a dress is it a female corpse? No.

There is a non-circular argument to discuss sex - sex is binary - but the people you are arguing with are unlikely to adhere to it as they don't think sex doesn't exists.

You cant argue with stupid OP.

I spent 2 years trying to do that on Twitter and it got so vaccum like I thought the whole world thought that humans could change sex.

I then left Twitterwas banned came back in to the real world and realised nope the huge majority of the human race know there are only 2 sexes and that we are not fish.

So sick of this shit and having to justify what we all know to be true. It is never the male sex that is called in to question - a man is a man is a man. But ask these idiots what a woman is and it is oh so very 'complicated'. Wankers.

DNA tests are quite cheap now for people who struggle.

Humans have two legs, if you have to have one amputated are you no longer human?

Nearly everyone (about 99% of people) have chromosomes which are XX (female) or XY (male). A tiny number of people have different chromosomes, but these are irrelevant when considering the majority of the population, in the same way the existence of people with 6 fingers on each hand is irrelevant when considering the normal number of digits is 5.

Chromosomes are fixed, so people can't change sex. A woman who has her womb and ovaries removed, or was born without them, is still a woman. A man who has his penis and testicles removed is still a man.

Scientists have classified all DSDs as either male or female. Their existence does not mean that a man who has XY chromosomes and has fathered children can become a woman if he takes female hormones and has his genitals reconfigured.

And if you have congenital malformation and are born with just one leg, does this mean people with two legs can grow another one?

Sex is determined by:

Chromosomes
Gonads
Gametes
& Genitals

So if you don’t have the gametes there are still the other categories to assess.

Most people won’t find out they don’t produce gametes until after puberty, so while they might be the most important scientific definition (?) they aren’t what we use to decide sex at birth (nor before, via ultrasound scan).

If you are a woman because you are of the class of people who produce large, stationary gametes, how do you know you are a member of that class if you don't produce them (ie are infertile)?

Because of the other symptoms of being a member of the class of people who produce large, stationary gametes - you were born with a female phenotype.

Obviously some people have a female phenotype but XY chromosomes e.g. because of CAIS, but this is very rare and does not change the nature of sexual reproduction in humans.

How do you then say that "you are still a member of that class even though your biology is broken" without opening that up to men saying that they are actually a member of that class just with more badly broken biology?

Because (assuming no disorders of sexual development) they are humans of the type that produce small mobile gametes.

The important thing is that we all have value because we are human, not because of our sex, but sex does have unavoidable consequences, and if we ignore the consequences we create inequality. Suggest they read 'Invisible Women' by Caroline Criado-Perez.

... who believe that because Alice Roberts says there's more than two sexes it must be true.

Have your friends actually said how many sexes there are? Three? Four? A hundred?

We need them to be specific. Presumably they have a figure in mind. Just saying there are more than two is a bit rubbish, non?

A good article here, debunking the idea that sex is a spectrum and looking at DSDs.

'Sex is binary in humans.
The existence of DSDs does not prove that there is a range, or spectrum of sexes.'

sciencefactnotfiction.wordpress.com/2018/07/03/is-sex-really-a-spectrum/

Males are X
Females are XX
Few people have a combination of the above which means they have a disorder of sex development. There isn’t a magical third chromosome which makes a third sex.

An infertile female is still a female. We know this for 99% of humans because we observe their primary sex characteristics at birth - the presence or absence of penis and testicles/vulva. Only in the case of ambiguous genitalia will a chromosomal year be administered.

Men are not faulty women. Women are not faulty men. We are a sexually dimorphic species, this is how we don’t try to mate with someone of the same sex and become surprised when a baby isn’t produced. Abnormalities do not disprove this fact.

If men and women are not different - how is it that something like 90% of the worlds trafficked children are female?
If men and women are not different - how is it that in certain countries they face a shortage of women based on selective abortions/leaving their girl children to die?
How is it that there’s rules around who can inherit? How is it that for basically the entirety of human history, men have been able to control women, denying them the right to vote, the right to work, own property, have their own bank account?

Human beings have evolved to be able to tell who is male and who is female. This might upset people that would prefer to be the other.

If I’m an infertile woman with no uterus, I’m still a woman. So why is a man who removes his penis not still a man?

She’ll be able to turn it round to suit her own crazy agenda but I thought I’d try.

Don’t let the ‘gotcha’ examples of differences in sexual development employed frequently to explain sex as a continuum derail you.

Differences in biological development is not used elsewhere to redefine humans.

There are are a huge variety congenital malformations that many are born with - heart, eyes, lungs, brain, limbs etc. That these malformations exist doesn’t change the definitions of human biology or render humans to be a species with a continuum of hearts, lung, eyes etc.

Some people are born without a toe, a foot a leg - - humans are not on a spectrum of leggedness - humans are still classed as a two legged species

Some people are born blind - humans are still classed as a sighted species

Some people are born conjoined - humans are still classed a species of one individual within one body.

No continuums ever applied to these - why should it be applied to disorders of sexual development?

Even if we are a continuum of sex classes - it is still irrelevant to the trans debate. Whatever class of sex you have been ‘assigned’ at birth - you can’t change it. I have no Y chromosomes in my 30 trillion cells and can’t change that. Please ask them how females can develop Y chromosomes, testicles and produce their own sperm.

On reflection - I suppose could have obtain y chromosomes if I received an organ from a male organ donor. I assume trans activists wouldn’t say that would make me male...?

Also as Pity alluded to - don’t assume the other person will respond to logic...

Obviously some people have a female phenotype but XY chromosomes e.g. because of CAIS, but this is very rare and does not change the nature of sexual reproduction in humans.

I forgot about this type of DSD in my earlier post.

But the existence of DSDs of any kind is irrelevant to a discussion about people who don't have them.

Sex classes in humuns are distinct and mutually exclusive. Individual deviations from characteristics of a sex class do not eliminate the class, do not exclude you from your own class and do not include you in the opposite class whose sex characteristics you do not share after all.

Female humans by nature do not produce large gametes before menarche, during pregnancy, while exclusively nursing and after menopause. Are they not female? Of course they are.

The normal limitations to reproductive function of females because of our age as well as abnormal limitations to reproductive function of females due to congenital malformations, hormonal imbalances, illness and disease do not shunt us from the female into the male sex class. It means that normal function is disrupted for some reason.

99.4% of females go through menarche, but if you surveyed the female population right now you would find that only one in four currently menstruate at all. Because not releasing eggs from your ovaries is very common and very normal in females.

However, most of us have or have had the potential to do so. What we do not have is the potential to produce and release sperm as we lack the necessary biological equipment. Of which there are only two types. And if you have type A (female equipment) you cannot have type B (male equipment) and vice versa. What other animal, plant or fungi species can do is irrelevant to the species we belong to as humans.

I find the phrase "potential to make large gametes" helpful as it includes all women and girls, no matter what their fertility.

There is no third gamete.

If you are a woman because you are of the class of people who produce large, stationary gametes, how do you know you are a member of that class if you don't produce them (ie are infertile)? Why doesn't your class change (if we use that definition) if you have your ovaries removed

Not a biologist, but ...

isn't this linked to the processes of evolution, and sexual reproduction? That is, there are genetic/chromosonal disorders because of the way cells /genes/chromosomes/gametes split and reproduce sexually?

Hence how we evolved in such complex ways.

My answer would be how many trans people have DSDs? Or ask them how many trans people have DSDs, as it would probably be entertaining to watch them answer.

And, if someone wanted to have kids, how would they know who to pick (or definitely not pick) as the other parent?

Sorry, repeating myself there, in a busy supermarket queue. Perhaps ask whether or not they are the people weighed down by Xmas preparation!

Infertile women are still women - women are infertile for most of our lives.
Pre pubescent girls are girls, post menopausal women are women. Women who are on their period are women, women on the pill are women.

Sex classes are like any other biological class; there is not one single marker that signifies membership of a class. Sex class membership is not dependent on being fertile at any one time during your life.

A man who loses his testicles on a battlefield is still a man, a man who has had a vasectomy is still a man. a man who is infertile is still a man.

What people seem to forget when discussing the 'sex is a spectrum' argument is that the whole reason why we have different sexes in the first place is to reproduce.

In order to create offspring you need a male and a female. Not 3 different sexes, or 4, or 5 or 6.

Perhaps you can ask your friend how many sexes they think is needed to create a child? And then ask them what the difference is between the required sexes...?

'I find the phrase "potential to make large gametes" helpful as it includes all women and girls, no matter what their fertility.'

Females are born with all their eggs aren't they? While men make them as they go.

The fact that women are being forced into giving all this explanation with people shouting , what about clownfish, eh? When 99.999% of the population of the world, for all time, have known what male and female are, is a pisstake. Badgers, hedgehogs and ducks know which is which but it's too complex for humans to know? And therefore males have to be included in the bio group female on their say so? I mean FFS.

'Follicles are fluid-filled structures in which the oocyte (also called egg) grows to maturity. Current knowledge indicates that females are born with their entire lifetime supply of gametes. At birth, the normal female ovary contains about 1-2 million/oocytes (eggs).'

Yet another oh so trivial difference between mammalian males and females.

I mean men make sperm as they go, obv.

The use of people with DSDs, infertile women etc to say HA so men should be on women's prisons if they fancy it is gross.