Apologies if this has been done to death, but when did the word sex become gender?

[Boscoforever]

I'm a nurse and doing a course in uni at the minute. Specialist area.
Have noticed that lecturers keep referring to gender when they mean sex.
Example: You need to make sure the patient's gender is on their armband.
What good would that do?? I need their sex, male or female, not their gender.
Has been mentioned in this capacity on lots of powerpoints etc.
I've seen it so many times in other places too recently. Are we not allowed to use the word sex anymore? It's really annoying me! Or do people not notice/understand the difference?

@NitroNine

"Why is it an “invasion of privacy” for a form to ask for a fact not a fiction?"

For the same reason that if the form asked for someone's fertility status, or number of children, or religion. It's almost always irrelevant, it doesn't matter if it's a fact or not.

"monitoring the pay gap,"

Gender is actually more important here, trans women suffer the wage gap just as much as cis women. It's clear why this is true: employers don't know what gender someone was assigned at birth before negotiating pay.

Obviously studies on the trans wage gap should ask people's transgender status, because it's one of the few times it's important.

Gender is actually more important here, trans women suffer the wage gap just as much as cis women. It's clear why this is true: employers don't know what gender someone was assigned at birth before negotiating pay.

Would love to see some statistics evidencing this - but as nobody collects sex based statistics anymore because .... reasons..... there is no reputable factual data.

Still - that never stops the old "repeat something often enough and some will believe it"

I always assumed that the use of gender to mean sex was a fairly recent innovation - certainly in the 60s and 70s official forms asked for a person's sex rather than their gender - but not so long ago I read a book by Shirley Jackson published in the late 40s/early 50s that referred to her children's "gender". She was American, though, so that might have had something to do with it.

OMG! People are having gender assigned to them at birth? That's horrific, akin to child abuse. Why didn't we know about this?

Is there a campaign to prevent it? A petition or something? I'd definitely sign that, it's outrageous!

@MrsOvertonsWindow

Gender is actually more important here, trans women suffer the wage gap just as much as cis women. It's clear why this is true: employers don't know what gender someone was assigned at birth before negotiating pay.

Would love to see some statistics evidencing this - but as nobody collects sex based statistics anymore because .... reasons..... there is no reputable factual data.

Still - that never stops the old "repeat something often enough and some will believe it"

Of course, firstly here are some studies on LGBT income and poverty in general:

One finding being that cisgender people are paid about 32% more than transgender people. www.forbes.com/sites/jamiewareham/2021/11/17/transgender-pay-gap-revealed-cisgender-people-paid-32-more/?sh=3341b80317b2

In the USA 29% of transgender people live in poverty (compared to about 16% of cisgender people) williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/publications/lgbt-poverty-us/

Trans people in the UK also face employment discrimination at high rates, a report a few years ago found that 1 in 3 employers admit to being less likely to hire a trans person (this is even against the EA2010!) www.crosslandsolicitors.com/site/hr-hub/transgender-discrimination-in-UK-workplaces

I did some more digging for the pay gap one, and found this interesting piece www.ilga-europe.org/sites/default/files/before_and_after_-_gender_transitions_human_capital_and_workplace.pdf

"For instance, a 2008 study found that the average earnings for transgender women fell by approximately 32% after transitioning. Conversely, the average earnings for transgender men actually increased post-transition, albeit only by 1.5%"

Pretty good data point demonstrating misogyny faced by trans women and that trans men can benefit from the patriarchy (at least in this small way).

Regardless of what opinions you hold about trans people, it's a fact that they are able to earn less than cisgender people, and suffer increased rates of poverty. It's interesting speculation, but in this case not really supported by the facts.

Sex is the word used by the law, we should reject this deliberate confusing of language its straight out of 1984.

refuse to play along with it and correct it where ever you see it.

something that really annoys me is being unable to state my sex on application forms, they push me to tick "prefer not to say" or "other" as they ask for gender not sex, yet the answers are male or female.

garbled bloody rubbish, we all need to reject with passion.

@VelvetChairGirl

Sex is the word used by the law, we should reject this deliberate confusing of language its straight out of 1984.

refuse to play along with it and correct it where ever you see it.

something that really annoys me is being unable to state my sex on application forms, they push me to tick "prefer not to say" or "other" as they ask for gender not sex, yet the answers are male or female.

garbled bloody rubbish, we all need to reject with passion.

Maybe you should be questioning whether sex or gender questions ought to be there at all, all they can do is serve to discriminate. Like, why does Amazon or my Hairdresser need to know! It's irrelevant to the service they're providing!)

(aside from questionnaires which are used for the purposes of anonymously measuring discrimination; these however are usually quite broad and all the recent ones I've seen allow you to specify that you are cisgender, so there shouldn't be any issue)

@VelvetChairGirl "Sex is the word used by the law"

Actually the law uses "sex" and "gender" interchangeably (in general, I think some specific wording in the equality act might make a distinction)

@ElaineFuchs
For the same reason that if the form asked for someone's fertility status, or number of children, or religion. It's almost always irrelevant, it doesn't matter if it's a fact or not.
Religion isn’t a wildly uncommon question on official forms in the UK. Not the Tesco Clubcard type, but more serious things. Number of children in your household comes up quite often too.
Fertility status actually is a private matter, unlike sex. Your fertility status does not dictate which services you should use, whereas your sex does. Your fertility status is not, unlike your sex, a matter of public record. What could be more private than an individual’s imagined self, which is what their gender identity is? “I don’t like this being recorded” is not the same as “it’s unnecessary to record this”; & being able to split data by sex is invaluable for sociologists, psychologists & historians. Ideally both sex & gender would be recorded to capture the experiences of trans people, but if it’s only one, it needs to be sex.

Trans women suffer the wage gap just as much as cis women. It's clear why this is true: employers don't know what gender someone was assigned at birth before negotiating pay.

Like @MrsOvertonsWindow I would be fascinated to see data that supports this overturning of women’s being disadvantaged in the workplace on the basis of their biology. I don’t think the world has magically changed…

I would appeal to you not to use “assigned at birth” unless referring to people with DSDs, given the terminology has been - frankly shamelessly - appropriated from that group: indeed from a very small subset of people with DSDs now, given the huge advances there have been. Everyone else on the planet simply has their sex observed at birth - & nobody gets “assigned” a gender at any point.

@NitroNine "Like @MrsOvertonsWindow I would be fascinated to see data that supports this overturning of women’s being disadvantaged in the workplace on the basis of their biology. I don’t think the world has magically changed… hmm"

I sent some links earlier in the thread. I don't know how to link to specific posts on Mumsnet, but they're on page 2 of this thread.

Are you suggesting that a passing trans woman wouldn't be discriminated against in the same way as passing cis women applying for the same position? On what basis would the employer discriminate if the trans woman passes? It's obviously not biological, or "sex based"

"I would appeal to you not to use “assigned at birth” unless referring to people with DSDs, given the terminology has been - frankly shamelessly - appropriated from that group: indeed from a very small subset of people with DSDs now, given the huge advances there have been. Everyone else on the planet simply has their sex observed at birth - & nobody gets “assigned” a gender at any point. "

I'm not intersex, so don't think it's appropriate for me to speak for then or use them as an argumentation prop. I'll research how the" assigned gender at birth" language may be hurtful to intersex people. Thank you for making me aware of this.

*Maybe you should be questioning whether sex or gender questions ought to be there at all, all they can do is serve to discriminate. Like, why does Amazon or my Hairdresser need to know! It's irrelevant to the service they're providing!)

(aside from questionnaires which are used for the purposes of anonymously measuring discrimination; these however are usually quite broad and all the recent ones I've seen allow you to specify that you are cisgender, so there shouldn't be any issue)*

it is important to know what sex a job applicant is, say you are applying for a cleaner role, most house cleaners are women because people feel safer with a woman in the home, where as most commercial cleaners are men.

same thing goes for security roles most on the floor security guards are men because they are better at tackling men.

the whole idea that there should be complete equality in the jobs market is pie in the sky, men will always be bigger and stronger then women, and statistically the most criminal minded too.

[quote ElaineFuchs]**@VelvetChairGirl* "Sex is the word used by the law" *

Actually the law uses "sex" and "gender" interchangeably (in general, I think some specific wording in the equality act might make a distinction)[/quote]
yes it does and thats what I was talking about.

Regardless of what opinions you hold about trans people, it's a fact that they are able to earn less than cisgender people, and suffer increased rates of poverty. It's interesting speculation, but in this case not really supported by the facts.

Do any existing studies compare like with like? There are endless studies showing that women and men earn different amounts for doing similar work. Has that been compared for transgender people? Does a transwoman earns less than other women for doing similar work?

@AmaryllisNightAndDay

Regardless of what opinions you hold about trans people, it's a fact that they are able to earn less than cisgender people, and suffer increased rates of poverty. It's interesting speculation, but in this case not really supported by the facts.

Do any existing studies compare like with like? There are endless studies showing that women and men earn different amounts for doing similar work. Has that been compared for transgender people? Does a transwoman earns less than other women for doing similar work?

Comparing like with like is the crucial point. Ideally the studies should compare two people who are exactly the same in everything except for the studied variable. If they differ in other ways, too, such as age, job experience, education, mental and physical health, geography and so on, then the findings are difficult to assign to just one of the many things which vary.

To give one example of this, studying how transitioning affects earnings should ideally compare people who stay in the same occupation they had before transitioning, and the relevant comparison groups would be otherwise identical women who have never transitioned and otherwise identical men who have also never transitioned.

There is also the difficult dilemma of personal choice affecting earnings. If a trans woman, to quote one example I know of, used to be a lawyer before transitioning but then retrains as a nurse, for whatever reasons, and starts working as a nurse, then her earnings will drop but it has nothing to do with how society treats trans women.

On the topic of if collecting information on sex even matters:

It matters greatly in medical data, because biological sex is important in many medical conditions. It also matters if we try to dismantle sex-based oppression as misogynists and sexists have very little trouble in deciding who are women for their purposes.

That mistreatment is based on both the actual sex of someone and their perceived sex. The latter may also affect trans women and it certainly affects nonbinary-identifying individuals whom others see as biologically female. But when data is not collected on the basis of sex, analysing sex-based mistreatment becomes extremely difficult. Yet it is sex which is the axes of oppression along which most people today in this world are still discriminated against.

Drives me up the fucking wall.
Particularly things like 'gender-neutral toilets'.

@AmaryllisNightAndDay

Regardless of what opinions you hold about trans people, it's a fact that they are able to earn less than cisgender people, and suffer increased rates of poverty. It's interesting speculation, but in this case not really supported by the facts.

Do any existing studies compare like with like? There are endless studies showing that women and men earn different amounts for doing similar work. Has that been compared for transgender people? Does a transwoman earns less than other women for doing similar work?

Yes:

One finding being that cisgender people are paid about 32% more than transgender people. www.forbes.com/sites/jamiewareham/2021/11/17/transgender-pay-gap-revealed-cisgender-people-paid-32-more/?sh=3341b80317b2

As for the trans pay-gap: www.ilga-europe.org/sites/default/files/before_and_after_-_gender_transitions_human_capital_and_workplace.pdf

"For instance, a 2008 study found that the average earnings for transgender women fell by approximately 32% after transitioning. Conversely, the average earnings for transgender men actually increased post-transition, albeit only by 1.5%"

There are some more links in my big reply earlier on.

@nepeta

On the topic of if collecting information on sex even matters:

It matters greatly in medical data, because biological sex is important in many medical conditions. It also matters if we try to dismantle sex-based oppression as misogynists and sexists have very little trouble in deciding who are women for their purposes.

That mistreatment is based on both the actual sex of someone and their perceived sex. The latter may also affect trans women and it certainly affects nonbinary-identifying individuals whom others see as biologically female. But when data is not collected on the basis of sex, analysing sex-based mistreatment becomes extremely difficult. Yet it is sex which is the axes of oppression along which most people today in this world are still discriminated against.

Yeah, definitely it's important recording this information for medical purposes. It's an area where transgender people and intersex people really suffer as they might not have bodies which fit typical female/male profiles.

ElaineFuchs
Regardless of what opinions you hold about trans people, it's a fact that they are able to earn less than cisgender people, and suffer increased rates of poverty. It's interesting speculation, but in this case not really supported by the facts
This thread is not about opinions about trans people - it's about muddling up language re sex and gender. Asking for clarification as to the data behind a startling statistical observation is good practice and very common in a field where emotive claims are regularly made that lack any substance or evidence.
I don't think that the "data" you have googled is quite the rigorous data that evidences your claims? The sales pitch from the solicitors uses discredited Stonewall research and neither am I sure that the Forbes opinion piece is rigorous. The 2008 research looks interesting based on 64 respondents who filled in questionnaires (mostly) at conferences. I'm not sure you can extrapolate that to a societal trend in 2022 in the UK but I may be wrong.

Are you suggesting that a passing trans woman wouldn't be discriminated against in the same way as passing cis women applying for the same position?

This applies to about 0.0001% of this cohort of male people not a peer reviewed statistic. A man who looked like he could be a woman could potentially be discriminated against in the exact same way by service providers who were unaware of his sex for whatever reason.

The paucity of reliable data in this area is always striking.

@MrsOvertonsWindow

ElaineFuchs Regardless of what opinions you hold about trans people, it's a fact that they are able to earn less than cisgender people, and suffer increased rates of poverty. It's interesting speculation, but in this case not really supported by the facts This thread is not about opinions about trans people - it's about muddling up language re sex and gender. Asking for clarification as to the data behind a startling statistical observation is good practice and very common in a field where emotive claims are regularly made that lack any substance or evidence. I don't think that the "data" you have googled is quite the rigorous data that evidences your claims? The sales pitch from the solicitors uses discredited Stonewall research and neither am I sure that the Forbes opinion piece is rigorous. The 2008 research looks interesting based on 64 respondents who filled in questionnaires (mostly) at conferences. I'm not sure you can extrapolate that to a societal trend in 2022 in the UK but I may be wrong.

I encourage asking for the data and evidence! Thank you, it's definitely worth being rigorous in this regard. However there is only so much time I can dedicate to this, so I have to put some trust in the writers of these articles, I'm sure you understand :)

Just one more example here's a chart based on responses from roughly 6,800 (American) LGBTQ+ workers last spring.

I don't have time at the moment to examine the source in detail, but I think that the Human Rights Campaign is a credible organization: www.hrc.org/press-releases/human-rights-campaign-foundation-releases-new-data-on-the-lgbtq-wage-gap

@Ereshkigalangcleg

Are you suggesting that a passing trans woman wouldn't be discriminated against in the same way as passing cis women applying for the same position?

This applies to about 0.0001% of this cohort of male people not a peer reviewed statistic. A man who looked like he could be a woman could potentially be discriminated against in the exact same way by service providers who were unaware of his sex for whatever reason.

Just to clarify: you're saying that passing trans women (no matter how small a proportion) suffer the same misogyny as cis women?

In that case, doesn't that prove that misogyny in this regard is based on gender presentation, rather than someone's assigned gender at birth?

For what it's worth, I also think that more than 1 in 100000 trans women pass!

Misdirected misogyny can be experienced by males, yes.