9am on Radio 4: Start the Week - sex and gender

[nauticant]

A muddled title, The genetic gender gap, but it sounds like they've got scientists on to talk about science rather than to arm twist them into science denial.

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000h2c0

Women are faring better than men in the coronavirus pandemic because of their genetic superiority, according to the physician Sharon Moalem. He tells Kirsty Wark that women live longer than men and have stronger immune systems because they have two x chromosomes to choose from. In his book, The Better Half, Moalem calls for better understanding of the genetic gender gap and for a change to the male-centric, one-size-fits-all view of medical studies. ...

The programme will be repeated at 21.30 tonight in a shortened form. Looks promising.

Huh! literal violence at 9am !! we all know how t*y those biologists are.

[joke] [joke] [joke]

Should be interesting listening

Missed the first bit but the expert Shiron (?) corrected presenter, replacing gender with sex.

This is a really interesting discussion. Thank you @nauticant for alerting us.

I'm learning a lot, and how fantastic to hear Gina Rippon - her research on the history of scientific practices around brain science - researchers "desperately trying to prove that the female brain is inferior."

this is a really interesting discussion. Lots of usage of the concept of sex based chromosomal differences. Dispationately covered. And the argument that women are genetically superior BECAUSE of the xx was also interesting!

And Oh dear the male biologist, Sharon, has drunk the Koolaid about "assigned at birth". Although he's saying that individuals need to be treated according to sex, not gender.

He doesn't understand that gender is a system for the oppression of women.

I am listening and was just checking to see if anyone had posted a link. It’s an excellent discussion. Reminded me that I’d been meaning to post a link to a New Statesman article by Sharon Moalem:

www.newstatesman.com/politics/health/2020/04/female-species-more-healthy-male

I agree with so much that the geneticist is saying but shocked he then said "assigned at birth".

Kirsty W is desperate to get the discussion onto identity.

Men are not women biologically-thank you!

Yes, Kirsty Wark wants them both to comment on the debates - but I think that what they're both saying (Rippon and Moalem) is far more important & fundamental than that.

But I'm getting a bit annoyed at Moalem's mansplaining ... It would be interesting to have Sophie Scott in this debate, I think.

Started off fascinating, with Sharon Moalem talking about women, genetics and how the X chromosome has not had enough study; and has devolved, thanks to Gina Rippon, into a confused discussion about social gender issues. Sharon Moalem keeps trying to bring it back to science. He argues that male brains and female brains do have a "sex" because of chromosomes (not hormones). Gina Rippon gets the last word asking for "brain finger-printing", whatever that means (I assume that someone in not wholly male or female or something).

I know people on this forum admire GR's writing, but she pissed me off royally in that programme. The problem is that she seems to be basing her arguments about male and female brains as a counterpoint to a load of deeply flawed Victorian and 20th C "science" trying to prove the genetic superiority of men and that some women were a bit unnatural (or "tom boys") because they wanted to climb trees. Sharon Moalem, on the other hand, was trying to argue that the X chromosome has been woefully neglected in medical research, and that possessing XX does confer a different medical destiny that cannot be influenced by social gender politics.

But there's another way of looking at this, Jessica - that Gina Rippon was helping everyone to understand just why the kind of fundamental undergrowth clearing that Moalem is doing, is necessary.

She was talking as an historian, as much as anything, explaining how we have got to where we are.

And pointing out that science is never "pure" but always framed by current social structures/ideas.

And Moalem's work is a demonstration of how past social frameworks for science have made his work necessary.

For me, it goes back to the sorts of things Kuhn was writing about, way back, about social paradigms framing and structuring science research.

Yes, Gina Rippon did have a good go at muddling things there. I might listen again to the (shorter) re-broadcast at half 9 tonight.

Loved it when he said, the male immune system is 'slower to get off the couch & start working'

I thought is was fascinating-the fact that women draw on the benefit of 2 X chromosomes whereas men only have 1. This is important especially in understanding why men are less resistant to Covid 19.

It all just underlines the basic truth that healthcare in some cases should be tailored towards your sex, not your gender identity.

That was interesting!

Both however, sounded very nervous and unsure when Kirsty Wark brought up the issue of trans identities.......as if they were hyper conscious of not wanting to upset or offend. However, as soon as they were back on topic of their specialism they sounded far more confident and sure footed.

Interesting point for me, was about looking beyond the visible or obvious structures to the micro level of cellular patterning/coding

Also some of what was said about how in recent decades we've been looking more towards sameness or similarity between sexes.....how looking to wards differences if now, potentially, of more interest.......

That's certainly my sense......that EQUALITY arguments and perspectives gets you to equal civil and legal rights - which is great, obviously....but that then tends to lead to a situation where differences are ignored or down-played.

It seems to be the case, certainly in the case of neuroscience, that plasticity, malleability and the potential for structures and pathways to change/alter on account of personal & individual experiences - leaves the door open to a very much more individualistic reading of brain science - than the more micro-level study of cellular biology/genetics.

And Oh dear the male biologist, Sharon, has drunk the Koolaid about "assigned at birth". Although he's saying that individuals need to be treated according to sex, not gender.He doesn't understand that gender is a system for the oppression of women

My feeling was that he was very nervously trying to use the correct language - when it came to the topic of gender identities. His role is as a geneticist rather than as an ideologue - and he didn't want to land himself in the predictable quagmire. But I think most people can and could recognise equivocation and waffle when they hear it - which is what both were doing when Wark probed this area of discussion.

You could hear the 'shakiness' in their voices.

Yes, Gina Rippon did have a good go at muddling things there. I might listen again to the (shorter) re-broadcast at half 9 tonight

Neuroscience is interested in pathways and structures....which are fairly malleable - it would seem - according to personal and individual experience, and how experience can alter those pathways.....So, in itself, neuroscience sees the brain in a more open ended kind of way, I guess.

She did sound nervous when on the gender identity topic; like she didn't want to offend or provoke.

I think relistening to the actual words used about sex/gender/gender identity segment might prove worthwhile.

(transcript is often even more revealing)

Neuroscience is interested in pathways and structures....which are fairly malleable

That’s what I thought was the point both guests tried to get across - there are some aspects of our physical selves that change for a myriad of reasons, which obviously could include hormone treatment and social conditioning, but others don’t.

I don’t condemn either of them for sounding nervous. There are a surprising amount of scientists who avoid the topic altogether.

don’t condemn either of them for sounding nervous. There are a surprising amount of scientists who avoid the topic altogether

Yes, shows far reaching the ideology is.......when experts have to watch what they say, and how they say it.

I think ideas around equality/ individuality/ difference versus commonality/similarity/sameness are going to be the major topics of this new century - across many areas.

I thought it was fascinating but thought Sharon was extrapolating a little too far out of his area of expertise into other areas of biology when he was explaining the implications of his work, and fell into a bit of mansplaining at that point.

Otherwise, he seemed to be trying to be sympathetic to the idea of transgender whilst what he was saying that his work was showing differences of sex and that didn't quite add up to that. I am sure he was trying to be mindful of other's sensibilities, without being completely knowledgeable of all the political wrangling around it which is understandable really. It is movement that has taken a lot of unpicking in places like here - other people know the reality but want to try and be nice without realising there is a line where this is no longer possible.

Gina's work takes socialisation more into account. She did sound worried at that transgender question - and it is probably worrying when she has already been involved in this debate so knows where things can go. But she was good

I enjoyed it - it was the best thing in this sort of area for some time, and they didn't say 'gender' all the time, which the BBC seems to prefer to sex if at all possible, these days. It was nice to have something about science instead of politics for a change.

Kirsty Wark did a good programme on menopause and HRT a while back. This is another area where there is a lot of political stuff about what women 'should' do and how they should behave, and is a complicated tangle of science, health and culture.

Listening now, I have to concentrate hard!

I know GR explains her position more clearly in the gendered brain.

Sharon did say at one point that sex and gender had now become uncoupled (not a direct quote). He didn't elaborate but that's the fundamental issue. If gender is no longer linked to sex what the hell is it. Gina's constant theme was we're all unique individuals at the cognitive behavioural level, hence the fingerprint analogy. I understand why she's nervous about overclaiming the biological differences, it's so easy to fall into determinism.
On the whole I welcome this line of research as long as it's thoroughly critiqued. I find it fascinating and doesn't conflict with brain plasticity at all. I wish he hadn't used the word superiority, it immediately provokes a backlash.

As far as I understood it, he was claiming that men have one set of genes on the X chromosome that code in relation to the immune system, and women have two X chromosomes, hence two sets. Either one can be activated in different cells, so that gives a back up if there is a duff gene.

If you have a gene that does not do the required job, you have a second chance with the second gene - however that may be rubbish too. If you are a man with a really good single gene - then that could be better.

Therefore, it is not a lot different to saying men are taller than women - on average, yes, but individual men may be shorter than a lot of women and vice-versa. Like a lot of sex characteristics. It doesn't mean that because you are a man you will be tall.

I think he was overstating on the superiority business, and yes it does provoke backlash because it is not absolutely true.

It does mean that on average women's immune systems cope better, and explains the greater frequency of auto immune illness in women. But it doesn't mean all women have a better immune system than all men. I would worry that if people are looking out for men in situations where they fair worse, they may be missing the same thing happening in a woman.

I hope this is understandable - I am not all that good at explaining things usually.