British Social Attitudes survey. How is best to answer this question?

[TheBitterBoy]

I am completing the British Social Attitudes survey, which seems pretty respected and partly government funded. Around 5000 participants invited at random every year.

First question is fine - What is your sex? A question about gender identity will follow this question. Options are female, male, prefer not to say.

Second question is the one I'm having trouble with,
Is the gender you identify with the same as your sex registered at birth?
This question is voluntary
Options are Yes, No (with a box to enter gender identity) and prefer not to say

I just don't know how is best to answer this honestly. I've never thought of myself as having a 'gender identity' and this seems to be a question in good faith and is collecting both sex and gender, which I believe is important.

Cwen thank you for that.

I suppose I'm being s bit defeatist.

Sex and gender is better than just gender.

The hooha over the census was bonkers. Statisticians saying wtf we need sex.
Govt don't care can't have it.

Took a fucking court case to get both. It's unbelievable but it happened.

And even though sex and gender were asked.
And even though answering truthfully is s legal requirement.

High profile trans people were encouraging others to say gender for sex..

And I'm sure many of them did.

So in view of that the boat has sailed.

Most people will take sex or gender to mean sex.

Some will put what they fancy.

This is queer theory in action isn't it? Blur categories.. Dismantle boundaries. Fuck with clarity. Do what you like.

As with loads of single sex things. They have already been turned from. Knowing what sex is and that adhering to the rules is important socially and policed.

To just. Whatever.

Same difference.

And once gone I think it's going to be incredibly hard to put it back.

It's a very difficult and complex question to answer. The way it's posed presumes quite a lot.

Yes. It's unclear whether the survey composers are using "gender" in its feminist sense - a system of power relations which serves to oppress women through gendered stereotypes & roes, based on sex.

Or in the gender extremist ideology as "an inner sense of whether you are male or female."

Thanks for raising the question @TheBitterBoy I've come across those two questions, paired as it were, to be alert to the current trans epidemic (I think a lot of is social contagion).

I'm minded to say that my gender is the same as my sex, but that is so complex, and not really true, because I reject gender. AND it cements the idea as a given that people have a "gender identity" (apart from a personality!)

But if I prefer not to say ... what are the consequences of saying that? Might there be an inference (by researchers) that I'm questioning my sex? or my "gender identity"?

This is the problem with quantitative research in some areas. A qualitative interview or possibility in all questions for open text is better. Open text can be analysed computationally through "sentiment analysis" - there are some very interesting ways of interpreting data through those tools.

@Cwenthryth I do see your point, however the one thing that improves this for me is if you select No for question 2 you are required to fill in the text box accompanying it with your gender identity. So I'd someone were to respond Yes to the sex question, then No to the gender identity question they would have to fill on male/female/whatever in the gender identity box. I can't get my head round whether this would give a more easily interpreted response?
More importantly this survey is limited unlike the census. It is sent out randomly to the UK population, and usually receives 3-4000 responses. If the proportion of trans individuals is as small as other data suggests, there should be little issue.

I answered yes to Q2 in the end because I thought it was important that my responses be recorded as a woman born female, and this felt like the best way to be sure of this given the statistics.