'What is your sex?' - ONS question, I nearly fell off my chair

[MissSueFlay]

I'm one of those people that corrects paper forms asking for 'gender' to 'sex', and I routinely drop out of any kind of online questionnaire or survey asking if my gender is female. I've been part of the ONS Coronavirus study since it started in the pandemic, and just logged my first test result in its new phase - and they asked my sex! And there were only two options! Not 'sex assigned at birth', and no follow up asking if my gender identity is the same as my sex assigned at birth - no, the scientists just want to know what sex I am, because that's the meaningful data they need, and they don't feel the need to validate anyone. Bravo to the ONS! (on this occasion)

I do find it ironic that the 'Covid Infection Study' abbreviates to 'CIS' 😂

Hurrah!!

But how will they know your inner essence if they don’t give you a gender pick n mix to choose from?

It's almost as if the virus doesn't care about gender identity isn't it... I do wonder how some TQ+ people would answer a question like this

OMG literal erasure of my nonbinariness

BUT HOW WILL THEY KNOW WHO IS SUPER SPECIAL AND DIFFERENT

<faints clean away>

Hooray!

How crap is it that what used to be a routine question is now worthy of celebration? It’s chilling how much this nonsense has insinuated itself in all of us.

I do feel like the tide is turning - slowly. There is a meeting at work where some people always used to introduce themselves with their pronouns, that seems to have been quietly dropped.

Long way to go, but some signs of hope

Well done them

Though Office for National Statistics wasn't the first thing that sprang to mind from the title of this thread!

Hurrah!!!

It's almost as if they're letting common sense take hold, who'd have thought we'd see this again?

Glad it wasn't just me 😂

I think that trans people might answer with their acquired gender or legal sex, but maybe the ons thinks the numbers are small enough it won't distort the data? Are there any footnotes about how to answer the question?

Thank fuck for that. Grown ups in the building for once.

Oooh - the ONS that made such a mess of the Census because they allowed themselves to be influenced by those with a personal interest in removing factual sex based statistics? Maybe the grown ups are finally starting to remove the tantrum based influencers?

Nope, just the question, the two options and the 'Next' button. So straightforward that everyone knows what it means, even if they pretend it's complicated.

Mad, isn't it?

Like with the pronouns thing, it always used to be the most uninteresting basic fact in the world that you were either a she or a he, based on your biological sex - one which everybody knew without equivocation and ticked the right one without thinking for a second about it.

But now, there are people who like to make it into something so strangely significant, are obsessed with announcing it and actually seem to 'celebrate' it - and then berate people who follow the simple rules of grammar surrounding it. So, so many amazing, fascinating things to enjoy in life, but the one thing they want to explore and adopt as their hobby is the most dull element of grammar.

The original Covid Infection Study was done with Oxford University, and this one looks like it's with the UK Health Security Agency. Maybe that's why it's better at asking for accurate and meaningful data?

Well, anyone can type the wrong thing in. Why would you think it would be 'trans' people who are unable to stick to facts?

Seems a bit 'transphobic' to me.

Why would you think it would be 'trans' people who are unable to stick to facts?

Would those be the facts of biological reality they stick to? 🤔

Well, anyone can type the wrong thing in. Why would you think it would be 'trans' people who are unable to stick to facts?

Seems a bit 'transphobic' to me.

Yes, anybody could type the wrong thing in, but it's a simple case of cui bono.

A 'standard' man who knows he's a man or woman who knows she's a woman would have no interest whatsoever in doing so and wouldn't give it a moment's thought before selecting the appropriate one.

It would only occur as a genuine accident - maybe if somebody is partially sighted - especially as they've done it in alphabetical order, with female first, when 'traditionally', forms would often have put male first.

Interesting to see this from Sex Matters, NHS going in the opposite direction

x.com/sexmattersorg/status/1729832930753552852?s=46&t=TE3B3uARfpnQU1AAwB0wqA

Well you can't actually stop people from lieing in this way. Surverys are always potentially marred by dishonesty to some extent.

It doesn't even have would rather not say as an option!

Meh. I'm the only female who does certain activities in my area. If I had a survey which asked for sex and then asked what role I played, I'd typically lie on the sex question (or the role, depends) as I very well could be immediately identified by some.

There's more to life and everyone has a story... I'm sure highly skilled statisticians can deal with some noise in their data.

👏👏👏