Another uncritical gender identity article in the journal Science

[TheBiologyStupid]

Science, the peer-reviewed academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, has been captured for a while, sadly. Here's it's latest uncritical example of gender identity nonsense: www.science.org/content/article/how-astrophysics-helped-me-embrace-my-nonbinary-gender-identity-in-all-its-complexity

I despair for science (more broadly) sometimes...

People who say they’re non-binary are so close to being gender critical it’s almost painful. They just stumble at the last step.

It’s either because they’re young (teenage lesbian girls in particular) and terrified of sticking two fingers up to society and activists and saying “this is who I am, I’m not bound by society’s expectations of my sex, I’m a girl/woman who will wear and do what I want, thank you very much.”

Or they’re older, straight, and don’t feel special enough and like the attention.

The rest of us are non-binary without going on about it.

But what does it actually mean to treat people with different gender identities how they would like to be treated? And what are the differences in how we treat women and men? (we don't have a culturally accepted way of treating non-binary people as that's a relatively new thing). If you're talking about the pointlessly gendered things in society - for example clothing designated for men or women - fair enough. Preaching to the converted! I wouldn't bat an eyelid at woman wearing a dress, so equally if a man wants to wear a dress I'll treat him the same as a woman and not bat an eyelid (nor heap praise on him for doing so). Great.
But there are other ways women and men are treated differently which are based on sex, not cultural ideas of gender. An obvious example would be things in the medical realm - not inviting a man for a smear test, say. Treating a man as if they're a woman in these circumstances would be ludicrous.
There are other differences based on sex and the physical realities of this - separating sport by sex for example. Men and women need to play separately to avoid unfair competition and increased physical danger to women.
You can't expect people to treat men as if they're women (or vice versa) when there's actually something at stake for doing so, and a clear reason why those things are different according to sex.

Yes. The only reason to treat men and women differently is when it comes to ways in which they are different because of sex - to do with different medical needs, physical size/strength/body shape and the extra risks posed to women by men (as a sex class), and roles in reproduction.

If gender is not sex then those things should stay as they are and you should be treated as the sex you are, whatever your "gender identity". And apart from those things, you shouldn't be treated differently - to do so is sexist.

However, I am happy to respect that a person has a personal, individual belief, that they are non-binary, or even that they're a woman when they're actually make or vice versa – people are free to have their beliefs. But then, just as with religion, the flip side of that is that they respect my belief that it's not true, and we don't impose our beliefs on each other, and I'm not expected to use preferred pronouns or let males into my spaces.

I only argue against and oppose gender ideology because it's being imposed on my, my freedoms, my rights, my spaces, my safety, and those of other women, and children. If it was genuinely personal and individual like a religion I would respect people's feelings and beliefs, if there was a mutual balance of respect.

For example I think astrology is bunk, but people believe it and makes them happy, that's fine and I wouldn't give them a hard time about it or explain to them why I think it makes no sense. But I sure as hell would if the government, police NHS and schools started taking it seriously, promulgating it as fact and forcing people to state their star sign and run their lives as if it was true.

I'm struggling to think of social situations where I'd treat someone differently based on perceived or their self-stated gender identity.

I don’t like that we are being called extremists because we believe something that literally every feminist believed 50 years ago. We are going backwards.

I don’t have a gender- I believe gender is a harmful system. When I say I am a woman I refer only to my sex, not my personality/ hobbies. I refuse to buy into gender by suggesting that I am non-binary, as if the binary is some tangible, essential thing and not a bunch of sexist stereotypes.

I agree with this.

Discovereads earlier said, "Even if you think gender identity is similar to a religious belief in spirit animals or crystal healing, it’s best to respect the other persons beliefs insofar as they wish to be treated. You don’t have to change your beliefs, not saying that."

I don't so much think gender identity is similar to religious belief. Rather, it seems to me, belief in gender identity is similar to religious belief - similar to belief in angels, Zoroaster, Thor, Jahweh, Allah, or, in discovereads' examples, spirit animals or crystal healing. Maybe that's what discovereads meant; it's worth being clear, though. This is about belief.

I don't share in any of those beliefs. At the same time, I am happy to live in a society where any and all such beliefs are tolerated - even celebrated - so long as those holding such beliefs do not thereby impinge on me, my way of life, or my family.

We have already worked this out as a society. For example, now in ordinary state schools it is anathema institutionally to teach children they each have a guardian angel. They may well be taught some people think, or believe everyone has a guardian angel - but, equally, they will be told some don't believe that.

Can we have the same for belief in gender identity? The cases seem strictly analogous. You believe in guardian angels/gender identity; I don't believe in guardian angels/gender identity. So, institutionally (what we say to our own children is another matter, of course), we tell our children, not that there is such a thing as everyone's guardian angel/gender identity, or that there is no such thing as a guardian angel/gender identity ... but only that some people believe everyone has a guardian angel/gender identity - and that some don't believe this.

That doesn't seem too much to ask. Can we agree on that minimum discovereads?

Of course we don't allow theist believers to force everyone else to say "insh'Allah" or grace before meals, whatever. Likewise with gender believers and their preferred forced speech in pronouns (pronouns!) and so on. No?

Is there a relevant difference between belief in guardian angels and belief in gender identity? Is so, what? If not, why should we treat these beliefs differently wrt children in our society?

For those who can read German, here is Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard, developmental biologist, German Nobel prize laureate (still the only German woman to win a science Nobel prize, I think) in an Emma interview, stating very clearly that there are two sexes. I can do a translation if required but I have another meeting this afternoon.

www.emma.de/artikel/viele-geschlechter-das-ist-unfug-339689