Woman

[FourteenSixteenTwentyTwo]

I’m not trying to be difficult and I’m sorry if it’s been done before, but my partner doesn’t have a definition of ‘woman’ that can also include ‘transwomen are women’ but insists they are under an ‘umbrella’ term but can’t explain what woman means.

So if it’s not ‘adult female human’ what it is?

I’m at a complete loss and feel like I’m arguing science and he’s arguing flat earth.

• was thinking more of things like ethnicity classifications, where there is no legal or biological definition at all. But to answer your actual question, there are words like "tenant" or "company" which have closely drawn legal definitions, but which are used a bit more loosely outside technical legal discussions. There have been instances where the word "spouse" in legislation was taken to include an unmarried partner in order to achieve a fair outcome.

I don't think a mismatch between the legal use and the way a word is used colloquially is a knock-down argument for the GC side.*

These a\re not valid examples at all. They may be used a little differently than in legal contexts but the word woman is now being used in a way completely and utterly at odds with legal and medial concepts. A bit of wooliness around spouse is much more akin to calling a 17-year old a woman than a person who is 100% excluded from the concept for all of their life on account of having a male body.

3. Can women in Afghanistan break free from their oppression by 'identifying' as men? By not identifying as men are they complicit in their own subjugation?

Well quite, only of course we don't know that this is happening to Afghan women as we have not asked them what their gender identity is. When women are murdered and it is reported on the TV that a woman has been murdered, this is obs offensive as unless someone asked that person what their gender identity was at the moment of death, we don't know that they were a woman (as gender identity can change - even if they announced this before). We need to check that women in sports actually identify as women and those who don't now can't enter any sports competition. We need to stop talking about the different achievements of boys and girls at school unless we have asked each and every one of them what their gender identity is after carefully explaining that it has nothing to do with their bodies. We can't celebrate women CEOs unless we ask them explicitly what their gender identity (separate from sex is) and indeed we don't know that we need to unless we ask each and every male CEO what their gender identity is. One of the house of cards that this is built on is the assumption that people a) have a gender identity and b) we can tell what it is unless they tell us otherwise. This does not apply to me or the many other hoards of ex-women on here (i.e. we used to be women but if the term has now changed then we are no longer women due to a lack of gender identity - perhaps we need 3rd spaces....)

I think some men just can't understand why being called a "body with a vagina" is so gutturally offensive. "Body with scrotum" does not have the same objectification and rape overtones... although if one were to say it while pointedly holding a sharp knife it might give them a similar jolt.

'A woman is anyone who says they're a woman' is a useless definition in any context, formal or informal. Like 'a table is anything described as a table'. It tells you absolutely nothing about what a woman or table actually is.

'A woman is a person with a feminine gender identity' is a definition that could work for the genderists, but they don't use thst because then they'd be asked to define that identity and there's no way to do that without referring to offensive stereotypes or a mysterious ineffable gendered feeling.

Something about anyone who thinks they are a woman is a woman.

@EarringsandLipstick My DC say this. They also say women should 'try harder' in sports where transwomen are included. They also say that statistically trans women are more at risk and more marginalised than natal women. In fact, they say all kinds of shit. For insight, the eldest is currently doing a PhD so not stupid. We have always agreed on political things but on this we are worlds apart.

He says I'm a Terf, I say he's being groomed.

Something about anyone who thinks they are a woman is a woman.

This very statement is a giveaway that he knows what a woman is really. It relies on everyone understanding that the first “woman” in the statement is the old-fashioned female type - otherwise what is it that the “someone” thinks they are?

It’s why “identifying as a woman” seems at first glance to have more meaning than “identifying as a squigadoo”.

It relies on our historical understanding of “woman”, even at the same time as people are trying to un-define (not redefine) it.

You won't get an answer op

Those who believe in gender ideology are never able to define their terms. You go round in circles for ever.

How you can identify as something you cant define I will never know but here we are.

The real question is , can you live with someone who thinks who you are is nothing more than a collection of feelings inside a man's head.

That's the real issue here. This goes beyond disagreements.

Do you want an actually useful answer that probably won’t please you or trans rights activists but makes sense from a cognitive point of view? Look up prototype theory. Basically all nouns except Proper Nouns (Lucy Smith, London, Cambridge University) are all names of categories of things. So ´bird’ is a category. We have a mental list of what a makes ´bird’ a bird - animal, it flies, has wings, a beak, feathers, lays eggs. Some birds fit this list pretty perfectly - maybe a sparrow or a robin. They are more ´prototypical’ birds But some birds don’t fit every criteria of the list. Like penguins and ostriches. The mental list of criteria for ´woman’ for most people probably goes ´human, higher waist to hip ratio, narrower shoulders, female face shape, breasts, can be pregnant and give birth, no beard/stubble, not balding, higher pitched voice, vulva+vagina+uterus+cervix, makes eggs not sperm, no penis/testicles, longer hair, wears women’s clothes, has a female name, prefers culturally coded items/activities associated with this gender. I’ve tried to write the order of those criteria into the order I might notice these things when I see another person. It’s not meant to be a perfect list. People’s criteria lists can vary.
So according to prototype theory, it’s perfectly normal to think and say that women have cervixes and also that transwomen are a kind of woman. Just like saying birds have wings and fly and then that kiwis are a kind of bird.

Show him a pic of Alex Drummond and ask if he would see them as a potential sexual partner. If not, why not?

1.human, 2.higher waist to hip ratio, 3.narrower shoulders, 4.female face shape, 5.breasts, 6.can be pregnant and give birth, 7.no beard/stubble, 8.not balding, 9.higher pitched voice, 10.vulva+vagina+uterus+cervix, 11.makes eggs not sperm, 12.no penis/testicles, 13.longer hair, 14.wears women’s clothes, 15.has a female name, 16.prefers culturally coded items/activities associated with this gender.

How would a transwoman fit into that definition though. The transwomen I have known 'fail' more than half those criteria. The only ones they uniformly pass are 5 and 13-16. I wouldn't know about 12. Some of them fall down on 7 and 8. All of them fall down on all the rest.

Kiwis don’t fly. Kiwis don’t have visible wings. Kiwis have feathers that don’t anything like other birds feathers. And we still think of them as birds. I’m not saying you have to/should accept that trans women are women. And I’m not saying that all criteria of equal or equally relevant in different situations. Including someone in your mental category ´woman’ has very different consequences and importance than when you’re creating an automated system to send out smear test reminders. I’m saying this is what’s going on in OPs husband’s mind during their discussion. This is the ´umbrella’ he’s not been able to explain very well.

Argh. No edit button. That post is meant to compare hiring an intern and sending out smear reminders. Different criteria in the definition of ´woman’ are important in those situations.

@Babyiskickingmyribs
That’s an interesting point about language. The problem is that ‘woman’ isn’t like a species category. It’s a word that is basically based on a binary definition i.e. either a man or a woman. To me it’s less like saying a penguin is a bird and more like saying a mammal is a reptile.

There are fundamental attributes that make something a bird, probably egg-laying or having feathers. In the case of men wanting to be women, it’s the fundamental attributes that they’re missing. They can have the hair and the dresses, but not the cervix or the uterus.

The answer Dr Stock gives in Material Girls is that there is such a list and we look for most of the attributes on the list. So "lion" would be something like big feline, has mane, hunts and eats meat, has tail, etc." and that encompasses a wide range of variations - Asian lions are lions just like African lions even though they look different, a lion that lost its tail is still a lion because it still has most of the attributes on the list. A tiger has most of the qualities on that list but still isn't a lion because we know "not having stripes" is an essential part of being a lion. Penguins are still birds despite not flying because they have most of the attributes on the list. But mosquitoes who do fly aren't birds because they lack most of the other bird characteristics (feathers beaks etc).

So your bf probably thinks that the list of what makes someone a woman is something like "female biology, long hair, wears makeup, has female-coded first name". Transwomen don't have the first but still have enough of the characteristics on the list to be "read" as women in his opinion. Whereas you understand that names, hair, makeup etc are not inherent characteristics of womanhood - probably because you have enough feminist theory to understand things like the male gaze etc.

So, do you love the guy? If yes I'd ask him to gender you every day, and when you are wearing trousers and no makeup the answer really ought to be a male gender id. If he's straight he cannot be attracted to you any more as you identify as a man for that day (make him call you Dave for good measure). Give him pictures of yaniv etc and suggest them as alternatives if he's feeling horny as they do perform "womanhood". Basically make him do the lion vs tiger test on you - if you have stripes, ie a uterus, you just cannot be a lion, ie a bloke. Even if you develop a taste for antelope. Women who don't or can't get pregnant are the penguins in this scenario - not being able to fly just doesn't make them mammals or snakes or insects. They're still birds because they tick every single other box for birdhood. Make him come to that realisation himself. Be dead serious about it, gender ideology is no laughing matter. He really ought to readjust his mental list of what makes a woman...

If you don't love him, dump him. It's a canary in the coal mine issue for me. If a man doesn't believe an actual woman telling him what womanhood is, he's a mansplainer / misogynist. Life is short, there's plenty more fish in the sea.

Big sign on the fridge
Woman: Adult, human female

He can't define a woman. You are one.

Another categorical example : is a tomato a fruit or a vegetable? There isn’t a ‘correct’ answer necessarily. It depends if you want to make a salad or explain plant reproduction.
OP you could tell your husband that it’s not surprising that women and men might have different criteria for defining ´woman’ or at least place different levels of importance of those criteria. Seeing a woman visibly pregnant is a good way to tell she is a woman (yes transmen can get pregnant but that’s not a frequent thing to come across). Men and women can use this clue to classify people they see as women. Worrying about getting pregnant, taking birth control, waiting for you period, trying to get pregnant by tracking your cycle, staring at your bloated belly wondering if it’s just pms or should you take a test? Actually feeling your baby kicking your ribs, worrying about the birth - all these experiences contribute to women’s feelings that ´can get pregnant and have a baby’ is an extremely important criteria for the category ´woman’, even if it’s something mostly only visible to others for a few months of most but not all women’s lives.

Does he have a definition of what a man is?

@Passmeamenuatthetottenham

Ask him if he would ever sleep with a transwoman and if not, why not.

This.

We all know what a woman is. Can we just stop pretending otherwise. It is really stupid.

Another categorical example : is a tomato a fruit or a vegetable? There isn’t a ‘correct’ answer necessarily.

It's actually a good analogy, because there is a correct answer.
The tomato, like the avocado, olive, cucumber, aubergine, beans, pepper, etc.... is a fruit. Sometimes they identify as vegetables. (particularly on pizza), but scientists classify them as fruit.

Tend to call the. Salad vegetables here

Should it be saladvegtables?

@EdgeOfACoin, ‘ What do all women and transwomen have in common with each other that they don't have in common with any men or transmen?’

Can YOU answer that question?

In a few years he's going to feel really embarrassed about this. You need to work out just how much of a problem this is for you. Personally I couldn't respect a man that stupid and spineless. The idea that my partner would try and tell me what a woman is boils my blood. Where do these men come from? My mum wouldn't let my brother in the house if he said something that stupid.

Try this.

genderarguments.com/openletterbiologicalsex/

extract

So that’s my quarter-through-the-year resolution: I’m not going to debate with you about the reality of biological sex, for the same reason I wouldn’t stand on the train platform debating the finer points of physics while the man on the tracks gets ground into meat. That might sound a little dramatic, a flourish of rhetoric to cover up a weak rebuttal. But how long have you spent reading up to this point? Five minutes? Ten? Then the world has fifty more mutilated girls than when you started. Were the men who carried out those mutilations confused about what makes a female body? Did they ponder chromosome parings and standard deviations when they chose who to cut? Or is that kind of nuance a luxury set aside just for educated, progressive, worldly men like you?

Isn’t it odd that sex was never so complicated before? There was nothing ethereal about our biology when it came to allocating the right to vote, or own property, or walk down the street at night without fear. We knew perfectly well what made someone female when that female-ness guaranteed a life of subservience and pain. Only when women began to say no did their bodies become a concept. So many feminists have made this point, over and over again. I see them say it. I know you read it. Did you listen? If not, why? And why do you always respond whenI say it? It seems youdoknow who has a female body, when it comes to decide which perspective is ignored.

Sex is such a mystery to you when women want shelters for themselves, meetings for themselves, words for themselves. Pardon me for asking, but is it equally mysterious when you log off Twitter and move over to Pornhub? The true nature of a female body is so complex when you lecture. Does it become simple again when you masturbate? Who does the laundry in your house? Were you somehow able to navigate an inchoate soup of X’s and Y’s to saddle your girlfriend with the dishes? Give yourself some credit — I think you know perfectly well what a female body is. But in case you don’t, here’s a hint:

It’s the only type of body that gets you thrown on the funeral pyre when the husband dies. It’s the only type of body that gets your feet bound and your breasts ironed. It’s the only type made pregnant through rape and burned with acid, the only type expected to sit quietly and listen while we redefine it away, the only type men have spent millennia criticizing and critiquing and buying and selling until the moment we decided we couldn’t figure out what the fuck it even means.

You know what a female body is, dude? It’s the only type of body that makes men like you ask such stupid questions. So please, stop. This is an emergency. This is three and a half billion human beings tied to the tracks, and you’re riding on the train. Your insistence on nuance, your fetish for accuracy, your smug deconstruction of common sense — it doesn’t make you thoughtful. It doesn’t make you wise. It doesn’t make you progressive.It makes you an asshole. It makes you worse than a bystander. A bystander does nothing. He watches from afar. You step into the fray just to prod the victim. I’m not going to step in too, laying out my rebuttal over the screams. It’s just not worth it.

Here’s my resolution: As long as pimps, priests, and politicians know what a female body is, I do too. The momentthey’reconfused — the moment they hesitate, the moment they qualify, the moment they adopt the restraint and caution you demand from the targets of their abuse— then I’ll happily open myself up to ambiguity. Until then, I beg you. Reserve your philosopher’s curiosity, your scientific rigor, for the ten thousand other questions thatdon’tmake a thought experiment out of an atrocity. What marks the division between knowledge and belief? How did life develop from non-life? At what point does a man losing his hair become bald and not merely thinning? Go tweet at Rogaine and get their thoughts on that conundrum. Leave rape crisis centers alone.