What do people mean by “identify as”?

[StillHappy]

The phrase is used a lot, but I can’t find any common definition of it.

It seems to be used to mean “I’d like to be”, or “I’d like to be treated as though I was”, but then some people also seem to use it to mean “all objective measures show I am not, but I really am, as I say I am.”

Is it any of these, none, or some mixture?

I’m a woman, but don’t think I identify as one. I can just see that I am from historic events (namely the children that I gave birth to.)

What is someone who appears not to be a woman asserting it claiming when they say they identify as one?

Is it a different class of claim to, let’s say, someone claiming to be a sensitive caring lover, who isn’t, or a woman identifying as the missing Russian princess, daughter of the last Tsar?

Is anyone who uses this language willing to flesh it out?

It is more than that though. It is " i have an internal sense that i am this thing. Now i have vocalised it, my stated sense on inner self must take precedence over how you perceive me regardless of the objective reality."

"Identify as" has a command of others implicit within it. It is not an invitation for observation or discussion or debate. Two slippery little magic words that tell everyone else they must ignore their eyes and ears or risk being labelled bigot.

I very much object to the concept that words can alter their.meanings depending on what the.person saying them.feels about themselves.

In order fir conversations to work.eveeyone has to be clear on what the words in the.language they are using means.orherwise you have multiple people taking entirely different things from the same.word changing the meanimgs completely

But he thinks he does feel it. You can disagree, and I do, but that doesn’t change how he feels. The issue is what happens when that feeling overrides rights, not the phrasing that person chooses to use.

To me "I identify as......." basically means "Ive swallowed some kool-aid and words no longer mean what they have been understood to mean for centuries. Im moving the boundaries to suit how I feel"

Anything an adult human female feels is a woman feeling X Y z.

If feelings could turn us into anything I'd be rich, a size ten, and 20 years younger.

However I'm.not. and having never been rich i dont know how it feels I can only imagine via stereotypes and bad movies. This is no different.

And anyone worth anything tells you the truth even if its not what you want to hear. Because its better to come from someone who loves you than finding out the hard way. Like maybe missing medical screenings cos you have been.marked down as the wrong sex. That can kill you so why would you let that happen to a friend.

But he demonstrably can’t feel it. What he’s voicing is some sort of error. It’s like saying you feel like a tree.

Our friend Joss Prior on twitter attempted to explain the idea of "feeling like a woman". It doesn't make much sense but if you are looking for an explanation from someone who experiences such a "feeling"...

"If we say we 'feel' like a woman, as a way of verbalising an abstract individual experience

But we cant explain more than that.

That doesnt give anybody else the right to fill in the gaps, to say its 'because stereotypes' or its an 'incoherent ideology'.

Thats just how it is..

I know I'm a woman by the standards of modern western culture as it stands. Two boxes doesnt allow for nuance

On those terms I'm a woman...

When I do the things that other women do...that doesnt make my motivations, gender stereotypes.

Basic correlation, not causeation."

twitter.com/joss_prior/status/1408910842633109511

Well, it’s something I suppose, but it all seems a bit post-modern.

Maybe that’s one of my issues with it, the post-modern-like idea that there is no objective truth; only my truth or your truth.

That’s not a healthy or tenable viewpoint.

Why can’t he feel it? Maybe he feels something completely different that you and I can’t feel?

I meant it, kind of, I was repeating what the poster said on a previous post.

It means they believe they are X inside and would like to be treated as such.

Its no ones fault that a concept falls apart when people refuse to lie or believe in something. I dont need to object to any concept.. i.merely need to know what words mean and refuse to pretend otherwise.

That's the fault of a precarious ideology that even so called experts cannot define.or agree on. Not an individual persons " objection"

I cannot see anywhere where Scully was grating enough to tell other posters what they wanted.

I think this next-level strawmanning was all you.

You're not psychic. Deal with it.

It was here. I’m not pretending to be psychic, it was part of a conversation.

In order to get a GRC you have to convince various professionals.
There is no such process with "I identify as ..". You (and you alone) say the magic words and it comes true (In some people's belief systems).

Yes, I have read that.

If you cannot tell the difference between her comment and your arrogance, then you have spent too long trying to manipulate small kids into eating their vegetables.

Give it a rest, or possibly stop hanging around with TRAs. There is another one on this forum who is fond of telling MNers what they want.

Scully is not your toddler and can tell you what she thinks for herself.

I have used this phrase before, although it also feels clunky to me. I’m genderfluid so, while I’m biologically female, I guess sometimes I identify as more female and sometimes more male and occasionally as neither particularly. I also identify as a bisexual (though there are a few transfemales out there that make me wonder if I’m more poly 😂). Then I identify as polyamorous because life is too flipping short not to try all the sweets in the selection box. And identify as a primal submissive as that’s how I approach sex (as in the act not the genitalia).

I think it comes down to identity, which is where the word comes from. We all identify as many things - from the weightier and unchangeable things above to chocaholic or pineapple-on-pizza-hater. We identify what our gender is inside (whether or not our bodies ended up aligning with that), what our likes and dislikes are, what our sexuality is, what our life choices are. They’re just labels to describe WHAT we are.

The problem seems to come when we instead use them to define WHO we are. Then we stop identifying these things inside us and draw lines to separate us from those that are not.

It’s a tricky phrase…but roll with it. If you are asked on a form what gender you associate with or identify as, they aren’t asking what you biologically are, just what you feel inside. If you are biologically female and happen to have boobs and no penis, then you just say female and don’t sweat it. It means that your internal organs have no bearing on the question. If the NHS111 website asks you what sex you were at birth, then you go with the internal organs as it will have a bearing on the medical advice they need to give.

For me, that’s a flipping minefield of a question as it changes on a coin toss but no-one ever has that on a form 😂

This is a bizarre turn of events. Let’s just ask @Whatwouldscullydo - do you want people to say ‘I am pretending to be female’ or not?

I don’t understand the jibe about the kids and vegetables.

*If you feel like you are a woman and have boobs and no penis, that was meant to say 😂

I think the most plausible way to think of it I've seen is something like, "One of my parents is black and one white, but I identify as black rather than mixed race" (or vice versa.)

It makes the most sense in terms of these kinds of connections that are not so objective in their definitions. Another example might be whether a citizen of Scotland identifies as Scottish, British, European, or some combination, maybe then also related to ethnic identification, and how much weight they give each of those things. Not their legal status, which is usually pretty objective, but their sense of who they are, what makes them the kind of person they are, where their duties and responsibilities lie.

It doesn't really map well onto gender.

It means 'I'm not but I wish i was.'

If you are whatever it is you are supposed to be no need to identify is there?

If you are asked on a form what gender you associate with or identify as, they aren’t asking what you biologically are, just what you feel inside. If you are biologically female and happen to have boobs and no penis, then you just say female and don’t sweat it. It means that your internal organs have no bearing on the question.

But my problem when trying to answer these forms is that I don't feel like anything inside. I don't feel like a woman. Equally I don't feel like a man. I don't feel like anything, because I have no idea what feeling like a woman or a man or anything else would feel like. So how the hell I am supposed to answer the question about what I identify as? I am a woman, because I am a woman. But that's not what those questions are asking hence I am stuck with how to respond.

People can say what they like. They just can't expect anyone else to believe it. Or go along with it. Or make others jump through hoops with language they have decided on without the consent of anyone else. Ajd understand most normal people don't believe it and those that do are merely using trans people fir their own entertainment. They'd validate them til they permanently altered themselves just for a laugh. Their followers are not their friends.

We identify what our gender is inside
But I don't identify as a gender inside. Until the last year or so, I have literally never in my almost 50 years alive given a single thought to what gender I am. It's not something that has entered my mind. I've know since childhood that I am female, I have had no need to in any way consider what gender I am. Now I have questions galore about it on surveys, forms at work, questionnaires I feel forced to think about it and I have no idea what gender I am because I don't identify as anything, and don't even understand what it means, and these questions don't seem to allow for that. They list female or woman as options but never "none".