How do people think you can change sex?

[CuriousBogInTheNight]

I've obviy not followed closely enough but genuinely how has it become controversial to say you cannot change sex?! Sex is encoded from the moment of conception... Are people thick or have they tried to change the meaning of the word sex?

And as someone has mentioned on another thread, some transwomen lie and say they have a cervix.
If your politics led you to believe them instead of the nasty terfs saying don’t be daft, it’s less of a stretch to their potentially getting a uterus too. (Not that I can understand how you could have a cervix without a uterus, but…)

I've seen more non-trans people wrongly using sex instead of gender and vice versa than trans people. And the trans people who use sex wrongly are usually the ones who are very new to it, or are very uneducated about sex/gender and how one goes through gender reassignment. I don't think people misusing a word is that much of a big deal though, transphobes cling on to every little detail while the rest of us just get on with our own lives and get over it.

Until it all went mad I was happy to treat transsexuals as the sex they chose to live as, just as I accepted people's choice of sexual partners from same or opposite sex.
Then TRAs happened and we were asked to ignore science. No. Just no.

@Elephantsparade

I agree about pink and blue brains being a factor. Id say most people I know believe very strongly that brains are very different so its not a big leap to having the wrong brain.

Do most people you know believe that women like washing up and are just better at wrapping presents? That men are more naturally suited to driving and running businesses?

Perhaps they believe women and girls should be kind and boys will be boys too?

FFS

I've seen more non-trans people wrongly using sex instead of gender and vice versa than trans people.

Yes, trans people should certainly have a word with all those people campaigning "on their behalf" trying to make out that trans people should be treated as the opposite sex in all cases.

Did you know there are people actually advocating for transwomen to compete in female sports, despite them being male?

Because clownfish.

The Official RC line today is full-on woo: "There is a change in the inner substance of the bread and wine that passes all human understanding."

(Which begs the question of how come you can be so sure if it's inexplicable?)

Jesus spoke about making his followers 'fishers of men' and made a pun based on Peter's name, so we know he was not above the odd metaphor, so why they can't just accept that it's metaphorical is also a mystery that passes all understanding.

And as someone has mentioned on another thread, some transwomen lie and say they have a cervix.

But this isn't the problem, people lie about all kinds of stuff all the time. The problem is when an MP actually believes this cobblers and is confident enough in his ignorance to broadcast it to the world at large.

So Howard, you agree that people cannot change their biological sex and that when transwomen/men say they are now women/men, they don't mean that they have changed sex but rather changed their gender identity?

Yes. Many people I know think things like girls are not as good at maths, girls are better at care, girls are quiet, girls are bitchy. Men just dont see mess, men are funny, men are risk takers. They arent stupid. We live in a patriachy and these are a prevailing undercurrent in our society otherwise why would feminism be needed.

I'm reading The End of the World is Flat at the moment and it's excruciating in its accuracy of this whole debacle.

It just makes you feel mortified for the world but also terrified at how easy it is to get some (most? Enough anyway) people to believe literally (yes, literally) anything.

@nauticant

And as someone has mentioned on another thread, some transwomen lie and say they have a cervix.

But this isn't the problem, people lie about all kinds of stuff all the time. The problem is when an MP actually believes this cobblers and is confident enough in his ignorance to broadcast it to the world at large.

Yes. I imagine the process by which it gets to the politician is something like ‘bonkers person lies’ ‘well meaning useful idiot believes and repeats it’ ‘ignorant politician hears it from them.’

There's a lot of obfuscation around sex/ gender, and it doesn't help that for quite a few people sex and gender are the same thing, and there's also obfuscation (misunderstanding?) around gender as a social construct versus gender as a feeling inside. And then it gets twisted further by the most nefarious activists, and then don't forget, #bekind, don't think about it too hard, because otherwise transphobia.

And also, somehow, sex is a social construct? Apparently???

It's all very messy.

@BoxOfDreams

"your gender is what some believe to be socially constructed based on the sex your body has been assigned" nobody is "assigned" a sex - sex is observed ffs.

And as for:
you can change your gender quite easily and you can change the appearance of the most predominant sex organs, but actually changing sex? I'm unsure you're "unsure" if people can actually change sex? Jesus christ.

Chill out ffs it's my understanding. Some people on here are moody af

That which we call a rose. By any other name would smell as sweet.

I had an interesting debate earlier on about changing sex (a car forum). I mentioned Professor Robert Winston (IMHO an absolute genius and all round nice guy) and this guy retorted that he also had a PHd in Biology and was certain that humans could change sex. He then posted links to people who had rare DSD's. He then tried to assert that the surgery which would be carried out would be identical to changing sex, with everything functioning normally.
I then pointed out using a car example, where you would buy a Toyota MR2, buy a lookalike Ferrari kit, bolt it all on, stand back and admire it, knowing that underneath it would just be an MR2.

you can change your gender quite easily

This is an interesting claim, since trans people often seem to be outraged by the idea that they have changed their gender. They were always that gender, because it's an inner essence thing.

Of course if you recognise that gender is actually simply a bunch of steteotypes, then obviously it is easy to change your gender. I probably did it this afternoon actually - I was wearing a skirt and I changed into jeans and a jumper. The jumper was from the men's department too! I might change back again later when I do some knitting though.

you can change the appearance of the most predominant sex organs, but actually changing sex? I'm unsure

Well your sex is evident in every single cell in your body, so... nope.

My brother seems to genuinely think your sex is purely what genitals you have. So if you have surgery you literally become the other sex.

I then pointed out using a car example, where you would buy a Toyota MR2, buy a lookalike Ferrari kit, bolt it all on, stand back and admire it, knowing that underneath it would just be an MR2.

An excellent counter. How did it go down?

I don't think people misusing a word is that much of a big deal though

When rapists are being housed in women's prisons with biological women (of the female sex) because women's prison is the prison that matches the rapists ''gender'', then yes it is a pretty big deal. And pretty hard to just ''get over''

My brother seems to genuinely think your sex is purely what genitals you have. So if you have surgery you literally become the other sex.

I suggest you show him some of the surgery results. Does he think they're actually, like, transplanting functioning organs, rather than just moulding flesh into shapes?

I guess by the same logic there are quite a few people who have literally become cats...

My brother seems to genuinely think your sex is purely what genitals you have. So if you have surgery you literally become the other sex.

Probably not a conversation you want to get into with your brother but does he really think this? Does he think that transmen become men after a phalloplasty? Has he seen what a phalloplasty looks like?

I bet he only really applies this logic to transwomen because he thinks a vagina is just a hole, and that he's not familiar with the appearance of neovaginas.

For the poster who said "I'm unsure" -

Yes you can remove a uterus. You can even create a fake penis out of other flesh. But every single cell in that fake penis will still be female (xx chromosome).

@andyoldlabour Robert Winston is pretty clear you cannot change sex...

Because, you know, clownfish, according to Dr Alice Roberts. I really want to know what she thinks of what Prof Winston said on bbcqt last night.