Not gender. Sex!!

[Bumply]

www.theguardian.com/society/2022/sep/18/why-gender-is-at-the-heart-of-the-matter-for-cardiac-illness

A really important article. But it doesn't apply to gender!

Actually, for at least part of it they DO mean gender (for some definition of it), and for that bit they DO distinguish sex and gender.

But it's confused because in the rest of the article they use gender to mean sex, so "gender" is being used in two meanings.

Oh this article has made me really angry! It was such an opportunity to show that sex matters in medicine and that women are discriminated against. Turns out if I decide to be a man and tell them I don't do any housework, my odds of survival go up.

No links to any sources of all that bollocks top of course.

So how should this article be headlined?

If the headline was

'Why sex is at the heart of the matter for cardiac illness', you can bet 99% of readers would think of sex as the physical activity, not the body/chromosomes.

And a big chunk of the issue is about the gender stereotypes held by the clinicians, not about the differences in the physical body.

Sexism?

IcakethereforeIam

Sexism?

Yes, exactly, it's sexism. A better headline would be "Why sexism is at the heart of the matter for cardiac illness".

To think that, once again, women are suffering and dying from neglect because of sexism.

Very interesting that, "Survival rates were two to three times higher for female patients treated by female physicians compared with female patients treated by male physicians." Women must demand women physicians for ourselves and our female loved one is the main take from that.

I do not understand how, "There is a test you may like to try called the Bem sex-role inventory that assesses how “male” or “female” your behaviour is – almost all of us will fall somewhere between the two extremes." Leading to "Our home circumstances also affect how we are seen: factors such as being the primary wage earner, having a high income or doing most of the housework. All these add up to how male or female we appear. When gender and biological sex were compared for how they influenced treatment, it was the perceived gender – the strength of the “female” score compared with the “male” – that made the difference in treatment and outcome. For example, “female” patients (men or women) were more than four times as likely to return to the hospital with recurrent symptoms after being discharged. Essentially, behaving in a manner perceived as traditionally female downgrades you in the eyes of a male physician – there is a higher chance that your distress will be seen as overblown, inaccurate or hysterical.*

Men perceived as "behaving in a manner perceived as traditionally female". What would that involve then? And are they really also told to fuck off back home with a couple of paracetemol?

I agree, this article has since really important messages, but the confusion between sex and gender dilutes it. I also felt really uncomfortable by how they portray females character as being the reason for the discrimination rather than, as others have said, plain old sexism.

The Bem inventory looks at 'masculine' a d 'feminine' and is 1) from the 1970s 2) controversial 3) the author considered androgynous to be the best balance ie a mix of both.
The article confuses this with male and female - which describe biology - whilst using woman/man to describe biology.
In other words... a dog's dinner of an article.

Nice bit of woman-blaming though - it's always our own fault. Even our deaths with treatable but untreated medical conditions. I blame myself.

There is this though:

When gender and biological sex were compared for how they influenced treatment, it was the perceived gender – the strength of the “female” score compared with the “male” – that made the difference in treatment and outcome. For example, “female” patients (men or women) were more than four times as likely to return to the hospital with recurrent symptoms after being discharged. Essentially, behaving in a manner perceived as traditionally female downgrades you in the eyes of a male physician – there is a higher chance that your distress will be seen as overblown, inaccurate or hysterical.

So, for once, transwomen are treated exactly like women - and will die early for it.

where by 'female' they mean 'feminine' assuming they are talking about the Bem inventory.

Not that I believe a word of their results on this anyway!

The issues of race & sex in healthcare outcomes really aren’t any kind of secret &/or novelty - at least, not to the patients from disadvantaged groups.

Dragging the Bem Test in seems… odd. There are now multiple iterations of it & as it’s self-reported it’s got nothing at all to do with how other people perceive you. We know that the same behaviour is perceived & received differently according to the sex performing it - male bosses are never ball-busters nor bitches; nor are there bossy boys - they are assertive, they are leaders, but pity the girl who dares to do &/or say the same things, because she is nothing but bossy.

I’d want to see data from elsewhere to try to pick apart - as far as one can - how much is related to broader issues with the American healthcare system. Was a breakdown provided by race, do we know?

Should perception of gender truly be an issue; with the way we see trans women speak & write about healthcare it seems unlikely many would have cause for concern. As I noted above, it doesn’t matter if they would score themselves as the most feminine person to have ever lived - the aggressive, demanding, entitled behaviour we’ve seen over & over & over again reads as stereotypically masculine, & it is the perception of care providers that is the issue.