Dentist's smorgasbord of gender options

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Today I was sent a pre-appointment medical form by our dentist's practice.
Someone has obviously been doing some diversity training as I was given the following options (drumroll please):
Gender
Are you:

• Male
• Female
• Transgender Male
• Transman
• FTM
• Transgender Female
• Transwoman
• MTF
• Additional Category (please specify)
• Decline to answer

What sex were you assigned at birth?

• Male
• Female
• Other
• Decline to answer

Aside from 'Additional category' you can only tick 'Yes', or leave the tickbox blank.

I have no idea what the difference is meant to be between a Transgender Male, a Transman and a FTM, but as it's all a question of self-identity then a dare say there is no official difference and no textbook definition either - you are whatever you feel you are! Also, no option to for non-binary or agender which seems rather phobic. Though one could always add that in the additional category

Interestingly, the gender categories were not mutually exclusive, so you could tick that you are Male, Transgender Male and MTF if you fancied. I've no idea what the dentist's diversity training would have told them about pronouns in that situation...

(I discovered that more than one category could be ticked when I tried it out with my 8 year old daughter's form, out of curiosity. I then had a mild panic when I learned there was no way of unticking the 'yes' boxes, meaning I had declared my daughter to be male, female and transgender male. Thankfully I was able to close the form and start it again).

On the plus side, the form does at least acknowledge the difference between gender and sex and asks what sex you are (though it would be better to use 'observed at birth' rather than 'assigned', and better too if sex came first...). Is it possible to be an 'other' sex though? I don't know much about intersex conditions but I thought intersex people were still male or female.

There's probably enough in this form for a PhD thesis in gender studies, or at least a chunky Masters.

I would simply decline to answer either question. The more that we do this, the more organisations will come to realise that their forms are nonsense.

I'm sure it makes no difference to your teeth so l would leave it blank.

not enough to erase sex, now we are erasing grammar. How can an answer be "decline to answer"

simply say your sex is female and decline to answer the gender question

😃

I have no idea what the difference is meant to be between a Transgender Male, a Transman and a FTM

What even is a transgender male?

A male?
A female?

Again with the whole 'if they are collecting this information, then why'? What are they doing with it? If the whole thing is completely meaningless why collect it and have to keep it safe under GDPR?

Your post made me laugh out loud - written very wittily! I love the image of your 8 year old daughter being simultaneously male, female and transgender.

I'd answer the sex question and leave the gender one blank.

Tick them all and really confuse them.

Bless them! At least they are trying.
The whole thing is a minefield. I probable wouldn't answer - does the form allow that?

Absolute bollocks as well as biologically vague at best and totally incorrect (and insulting to the DSD population) at worst.
People with DSDs are still either male or female, not both, and not somewhere in between. The only reason I can see that "other" option being in there is if someone was INCORRECTLY observed to be A at birth and then later found to be B, so technically their sex was recorded wrongly. I'm willing to bet this applies to about 10 people in the UK and so vanishingly unlikely to be patients of your dental practice.

Even then that's a reach. There is no "other".

This has all become laughable at this point. Just wait until "cat gender" and all the other shite is made as legitimate as trans, then the forms will be even worse.

Charitably, a dentist might need to know your sex i.e. if you’re male or female as males have three bones/two points in their chins and women have two bones/one point. This might affect tooth stuff but idk.
Fuck knows what the gender questions are on about though. Could they be being darkly sarcastic and taking the piss at all?

I visited a dentist recently away from home, so had to fill in new patient paperwork.

The form options offered were

Gender:
Male
Female

I crossed out 'gender' and wrote 'sex' before ticking the female box. I figured if I passed out during the treatment and an ambulance had to be called that my sex may be relevant to treatment.

I noted that the initially very friendly and smiley receptionist was decidedly cooler as I paid and left following my appointment. This wasn't in the UK, by the way, but a neighbouring country that has fallen hook, line and sinker for gender woo.

These are very good points.
The practice is part of one of those national chains, and I’ve no doubt it’s head office that’s responsible for the form.

When I’ve a bit more time I’ll email them to ask why are they collecting this GDPR sensitive personal data, how is it relevant to a patient’s treatment, and how it cannot be for any kind of equality monitoring given that only sex and gender reassignment are protected characteristics.

If they are going to do this at all, surely asking if you have had any 'feminising' or 'masculinising' surgery on your skull or jaw would be the relevant question?

"I then had a mild panic when I learned there was no way of unticking the 'yes' boxes, meaning I had declared my daughter to be male, female and transgender male."

😆😆😆😆😆

I mean your daughter is still valid!!

Ours say sex- male or female and then preferred title with a blank box. That's all I really want to know. No need to complicate things.

I think this is a good approach, personally. Trans people are more likely to honestly answer the sex assigned at birth (yes, I think the wording there is bad) if they are given the option to specify their gender identity first.

I don’t have a problem with places collecting data on how people want to be referred to (though there may be GDPR issues the dentist has not properly considered) providing there’s a way to decline to buy into the whole thing. I am concerned with data on sex being accurately collected and this may be one of the best ways to do that.