Page 2 | How can you have a "gender identity" at birth.?

Leafstamp · 07/06/2021 18:26

I think it probably means they shouldn't be asking for it and that you certainly don't need to provide it.

General GDPR comes into play, which I'm far from an expert on, but I understand as basically saying you need a proper reason to hold information.

Leafstamp · 07/06/2021 18:27

Yes, but gender identity at birth is also inappropriate.

I don't disagree!

jellybeansforbreakfast · 07/06/2021 18:29

@hallouminatus it means some numpty wrote that section of the data collection form and that the ICO would ask some quite severe questions if they were sent copy of it.

Whatsnewpussyhat · 07/06/2021 18:31

Is their any need for them to actually collect any data relating to 'gender identity' because it isn't a protected characteristic and had no legal definition?

Soontobe60 · 07/06/2021 18:33

@Leafstamp

I read it as information about:

Sexual orientation
Gender identity at birth

Not Sexual orientation at birth - that would be completely inappropriate!

As is the ‘gender identity at birth’ bit.

Leafstamp · 07/06/2021 18:44

Yes, @Soontobe60, see my post at 18.27.

PumpkinSpiceWoman · 07/06/2021 20:27

@CovidCorvid

Because that's what I've been asked to complete a form on by my university where I'm studying. Surely a newborn can't identify as anything and hasn't grasped the concept of gender?

Email about this copied below:

Dear Student,

We are writing to you to ask you to complete a short online form (it will take less than two minutes to complete) to help us gather data we haven’t collected on your student record for our statutory return to the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA).

HESA requires us to collect this information (about sexual orientation and gender identity at birth) so that they can monitor equality and diversity in the higher education sector. We ask these questions of all students who sit within our HESA population. Normally we collect this during the online registration/re-registration process, but we have identified that you were not asked these questions at that time. HESA collect information on other equality and diversity indicators too, which you were asked when you registered/re-registered.

You are confusing a property that science suggests is present at or soon after birth with the able to express oneself. Those are not the same thing. Glad to be of help to you.

ChewtonRoad · 07/06/2021 21:46

You are confusing a property that science suggests is present at or soon after birth with the able to express oneself.

Utter nonsense. There is no valid science that has quantified or located what is termed "gender identity" as gender is merely a collection of stereotypes that some people choose to ascribe to themselves or others.

You may claim to have a gender identity but there is no requirement for anyone to agree to it or claim one for themselves.

That "gender identity at birth" was asked rather than the person's sex (no need to include "observed at birth" since humans cannot change sex) only confirms the batshittery of conflating the words sex and gender and why the meaning of words continues to be so important.

CharlieParley · 07/06/2021 21:56

You are confusing a property that science suggests is present at or soon after birth with the able to express oneself. Those are not the same thing. Glad to be of help to you.

Do you honestly believe this, PumpkinSpiceWoman?

Shall I dive into early childhood development again to explain why what you are saying here is impossible and has certainly not been suggested by any actual science? Let me know.

In the meantime, I would be extremely interested in reading any studies you have read claiming that gender identity develops at or shortly after birth. That there any scientific research papers on this is news to me and I've been reading lots of papers about gender identity.

NiceGerbil · 07/06/2021 22:16

Let's be straightforward here.

I'm pretty certain they meant gender assigned at birth.

But fucked it up because not everyone who writes a form like this is au fair with it all. And they bungled it.

Another reason for clear language that everyone pretty much gets.

Because this form doesn't even know what it's counting. So there's no fucking point in asking the question.

NiceGerbil · 07/06/2021 22:18

Huh?

Babies have an internal strong sense of their gender id???!!!

I don't have one now and I'm in my 40s!

littlbrowndog · 07/06/2021 22:25

If there was a strong gender identity at birth then the babies that are killed or abandoned at birth for being girls would just identify out of being that gender 🤷‍♀️

NiceGerbil · 07/06/2021 22:31

This is another thing that has always made me ????

Transsexual people strongly feel that they are the wrong sex physically. That's well recorded and understood and must be so incredibly hard.

This morphed into transgender where it has nothing to do with bodies and instead a feeling inside. Ok. If you feel that way, again, it must be hard.

The concept of internal gender id, which by definition some people feel is at odds with their sex/ gender (?)

Got extrapolated to

It's a very strong feeling
Only a very small number of people don't have it
Most people's internal strongly felt internal sense of gender id matches their sex

BUT

has anyone ever studied this properly?

I've not seen anything.

The definitions I've seen would make pretty much everyone non binary or similar. And big posts on here in aibu had maybe 1 or 2 women out of scores saying they had this feeling.

But. We're all cis. It can't be true that 98% of women have a trans ID can it? Because if it's true that screws the whole thing.

So.

The extrapolation (and now to babies!) about this string internal feeling that we don't know is actually widely felt

And

The prevention of studies eg do non trans people have this feeling? Do males have it more than females? Is it a characteristic well understood enough to base law on?

Etc etc etc

DdraigGoch · 07/06/2021 22:34

@NiceGerbil

Let's be straightforward here.

I'm pretty certain they meant gender assigned at birth.

But fucked it up because not everyone who writes a form like this is au fair with it all. And they bungled it.

Another reason for clear language that everyone pretty much gets.

Because this form doesn't even know what it's counting. So there's no fucking point in asking the question.

Or indeed they meant "sex observed at birth".

I've been thinking about this whole concept of "gender assigned at birth". Does it not occur to people who say this that for many people these days, gender (that is, the stereotypes commonly ascribed to each sex) is assigned before birth? People see the sex on the 20 week scan and decide that based on whether the foetus is male or female, they will have a 'gender reveal' party where they demonstrate their agreement with the stereotype that pink dollies are for girls and blue tractors are for boys. They will then set about decorating the nursery in this sort of fashion: s1.dmcdn.net/v/OcsJQ1Vo1VKYyMDFw/x1080

NiceGerbil · 07/06/2021 22:39

Well yes it's sex observed and always has been.

The idea that throughout the world and through human history any unattended birth would mean the mother/ parents wouldn't know the sex is ludicrous.

NiceGerbil · 07/06/2021 22:40

The gender assigned- in the sense of sex role- is the reason girls get aborted.

They are low value.

NiceGerbil · 07/06/2021 22:41

Gender reveal parties all pink blue etc show how early stereotyping starts.

ErrolTheDragon · 07/06/2021 23:03

This sounds like something that needs taking up with the HESA.

HESA requires us to collect this information (about sexual orientation and gender identity at birth) so that they can monitor equality and diversity in the higher education sector.

Firstly, they should be asking about protected characteristics (sex and gender reassignment) , and secondly they should make sure responding institutions don't further mangle it by idiocies such as 'gender identity as birth'.

The questions as used in the census might be a sensible enough solution rather than unis and other stats gatherers making up odd categories.

CharlieParley · 07/06/2021 23:06

I was told my children's sex at 26, 17, 15 and 13 weeks.

The last was a 3d ultrasound scan I took my dad to and it was a magical experience. And funny, as the wee fella peed right on cue and the doctor printed a photo showing an unambiguously male fetus.

GCAcademic · 07/06/2021 23:14

HESA collects data about sex, not gender.

CharlieParley · 07/06/2021 23:36

@CovidCorvid

Because that's what I've been asked to complete a form on by my university where I'm studying. Surely a newborn can't identify as anything and hasn't grasped the concept of gender?

Email about this copied below:

Dear Student,

We are writing to you to ask you to complete a short online form (it will take less than two minutes to complete) to help us gather data we haven’t collected on your student record for our statutory return to the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA).

HESA requires us to collect this information (about sexual orientation and gender identity at birth) so that they can monitor equality and diversity in the higher education sector. We ask these questions of all students who sit within our HESA population. Normally we collect this during the online registration/re-registration process, but we have identified that you were not asked these questions at that time. HESA collect information on other equality and diversity indicators too, which you were asked when you registered/re-registered.

I would query this (if you feel you can).

HESA actually states that they're supposed to ask if the student's gender identity is the same as their gender assigned at birth.

Which is not much better than what your university wrote, but at least it's not as weird.

Interestingly, the quality control rules for this field (GENDERID aka gender identity) specify that if more than 10% of entries choose NO then it's flagged as an error as

"It is not expected that there will be this number of students coded as having a Gender identity that is different to the gender originally assigned at birth."

The only problem is that they are not - according to HESA's specification collecting any information on gender. The field for gender assigned at birth is still called sex identifier (SEXID), and on the page for that data entry they explain that the reason this data is required is

To monitor equal opportunities issues in the higher education sector and support higher education providers in meeting their obligations under the Equality Act 2010.

No such reason is given for collecting gender identity. So at least in the inner workings of their data collection they know this isn't a protected characteristic they must collect data on.

Amusingly, HESA also advise that

The guidance 'Advance HE recommends the use of the terms 'other' and 'prefer not to say' for people who associate with the terms intersex, androgyne, intergender, ambigender, gender fluid, polygender and genderqueer', has been removed as it was causing confusion.

www.hesa.ac.uk/collection/c20051/index

CharlieParley · 07/06/2021 23:58

Just wanted to add, I would write to both HESA and my university explaining that there is a missing field on the gender identity question : not applicable.

None of the available answers are true for me, because I don't have a gender identity and I was not assigned a gender at birth (neither in the meaning of sex nor in the meaning of the norms, expectations and stereotypes imposed on female children by the society they live in. My mother is a radical feminist and taught me that those are socially constructed restrictions that I do not have to comply with.)

They might as well ask me if my religious affiliation now is the same as the one that was assigned to me at birth. I'm an atheist. Born into an atheist family. Neither yes nor no are correct answers. Atheism is not a religion. And it's not that I prefer not to say. I'm very happy to tell people I'm an atheist. It's that this question is not applicable to me. Arguably, not giving me that option denies my lived reality. Just like the question about gender identity is not applicable to me because I do not believe in the doctrine of gender identity.