Biology is not as simple as one might think trust me i am a biologist….

[Karensalright]

Is it the case that those supporting gender ideology have developed a new tactic? Coming on here pretending to be a scientist stating their profession, and then proffering their expert knowledge via a link to wiki?

Surely if they were telling the truth they would link us to a peer review paper from a scientific website.

Is it a new trend or have I just cottoned on to it. In an attempt to influence new comers.

Replies and discussion gratefully appreciated, as long as you don't point out that i can be a bit thick..

Apologies for a minor derail, but this is just starting to remind me of the Fallout video games - A Mysterious Stranger features, as do a gang called "The Tunnel Snakes" 😂😂

@Tinysoxxx @Karensalright

As I said in my original post, I am an XX/ female/woman and have never considered myself anything else, despite my irrational lifelong hatred of the colour pink, talon fingernails and the current fashion for the trout pout. And have identified as a feminist since before (I suspect) many posters on here were born, possibly before their mothers were born. Not that it makes my opinions any more valid than anyone else’s.

And, for the record, I oppose

• any form of hormone therapy for gender manipulation of pre-pubertal and adolescent children
• allowing anyone who has had the physical advantage in body development of male puberty to compete against women who have not
• mixed sex hospital wards and prisons

(Remembers "The XYY Man" from ITV in the 70s)

I doubt you were identifying as a feminist before I was born, unless you were a very odd 6 year old.

There is no "genuine intersex". There are a variety of different DSDs or VSDs if you prefer. Semenya is male and has the same DSD as those who are known as Güevedoce in the Dominican Republic. So, yes, Semenya is male.

There's a whole lot of identifying going on ( and half baked science).

Buff-tip moths really look like a stick. Mimic octopus's can do a cracking impression of a sea snake.
Leaf insects can make you think they are a leaf. The margay does an amazing impersonation of a monkey.

My seeing a moth as a twig doesn't stop it from flying. A monkey thinking a margay is a fellow monkey doesn't stop it from eating the monkey.
How we perceive something doesn't make material changes to it. So while it's fine to 'see' TW's as women it doesn't make them women anymore than an octopus can turn into a snake. 🐙🐍

@FlemishHorse thanks for that information. I will leave it at that

You know that Caster Semenya has a DSD that is 5ARD, don’t you? A male only DSD. And comes from a region in South Africa know to be a cluster region for the DSD. Hence the region was targeted by Ekkart Arbeit who had previous doped female athletes with testosterone. Something of a testosterone specialist you could say.

Semenya has a healthy testosterone level that is nothing like that of a ‘female’ level. And would have known very well that they were not female because they went through male puberty and not female and had no periods.

You seem to be ill informed.

It's a classic technique. Drop in a few long words, a bit of reality and then cover in bullshit.

Human beings cannot change sex. The point of sex from a biological perspective is to perpetuate a species, by making more individuals. There are two ways of making more individuals of a species. Sexual and asexual. Human beings reproduce sexually. Which means you need a male and a female. Human females produce eggs, human males produce sperm. Simples.

Just because it doesn't always work on an individual basis is irrelevant when you're talking about the biological reason for it.

And all the stuff about chromosomes is just the building blocks that make somebody male or female (among other things). With secondary characteristics being stuff that develops in puberty but are a consequence of being male or female and do not make you male or female.

I studied the cutting edge of developmental genetics in my honours year. We were looking at the very latest peer reviewed findings. This was 96/97 (the sonic the hedgehog gene was a thing, if you were there, you'll know). So anyhoo like the Sega Megadrive I'm a lot out of date and anyway forgot most of it. You wouldn't catch me arguing from a claim of special expertise, but I have enough residual knowledge, I hope, to smell bullshit. Or in other words have a decent sense of "seems legit" vs "citation needed".

FlemishHorse
The modern term is person with a DSD. "Intersex" is rude and othering. Everyone with a DSD is either male or female. Some DSDs only affect males, others only affect females.

Caster Semenya has 46 XY, 5-ARD. Caster is male. The 46, XY bit just means male. The 5-ard bit refers to alpha-reductase deficiency, which prevents the synthesis of testosterone into DHT, which is the hormone that promotes the development of external male sex organs.
5-ard is heritable. If Caster had had a twin sister, she would not have been affected because the development of a penis is not part of female sexual development.

Men with this condition usually look unambiguously male, though they lack facial hair. They have internal testes which produce male levels of testosterone. They go through normal male puberty and often the penis develops a little more at that stage. They are fact normal males apart from the appearance of their external genitals.

CAIS/PAIS are conditions in which males do not have the receptors to respond to the signals of the various androgens they produce. CAIS stands for complete androgen insensitivity syndrome and PAIS stands for partial androgen insensitivity syndrome. CAIS males in effect never go through male puberty. They are taller than average for men because the testosterone surge at puberty would normally act to limit growth. They have no female sex organs except a sort of proto-vagina, a short blind pocket. Hormones and enzymes for sex development work both by triggering sexual development and suppressing opposite sex development. For example, the instructions to make a penis are also the instructions to NOT make a vagina. That is why a DSD affecting the penis can result in a blind pocket. Breast development would be similar to a female because not counteracted by the effect of androgens. If you met a CAIS male, you would think you were meeting a woman.

PAIS males can respond to and utilise testosterone and other androgens to some degree and may experience changes in puberty.

Women can pass on the gene for AIS but never have the condition themselves, obviously.

The whole area of research is fascinating, but you always have to remember you are talking about real people with real health problems, most of which are not to do with having ambiguous-looking external genitalia.

I'm still quite curious about what you were getting at with the sense of femaleness theory. How do you envisage it developing?

@Snowypeaks
I'm still quite curious about what you were getting at with the sense of femaleness theory. How do you envisage it developing?

It's hardly a theory, I can’t see it being subject to empirical testing. How would you personally describe how you “know” that you are female? (If you consider you are; apologies for the presumption.)

What makes you think that something happens in the womb to give a person an opposite sex gender identity?

I know I am female because I have a female body.

Presumably you just are what you are, there is no "knowing" in the sense that you're (I assume) meaning it.
Discomfort with what you are does not mean you are not what you are.
The majority of people don't find comfort in their sex, they just are their sex.

There are people who feel discomfort with their race, it does not mean that they are not of their race.
There are people who feel discomfort in being able bodied, it does not mean they should have been born disabled.

Cass flash- gender dysphoria no evidence whatsoever of anything other than a psychiatric disorder, that needs a psychiatric support service that requires support, therapy and none invasive treatments. For the very few maybe surgical interventions to improve psychiatric outcomes.

Ergo men are men and women are women. Anything else is a disorder.

How do i know. Because gender questioning is a dealt with by PSYCHIATRIC SERVICES.

Simples.

Still waiting for an answer to this.

I think it’s perfectly possible that some humans that present as men have “a sense of self” as female. I’m happy to accept that they are females, who have suffered a genetic/hormonal accident in their early development. And accept them with sympathy as women.
@FlemishHorse I still have no idea what a sense of self as a female is, can you please explain.

@wiffin
It's a classic technique. Drop in a few long words, a bit of reality and then cover in bullshit.

In the immortal words of Pooh…
”I am a bear of very little brain, and long words bother me”

I don't 'feel' female, I am female. I have no idea if other women feel like I do or if men do or if no-one does. I only know how being me feels. I know I'm female because I have female anatomy, went through female puberty, after many years and some assistance got pregnant, gave birth breast-fed and am currently peri- menopausal.
I love football, loathe pink, enjoy beer but also like gin, I cannot bring myself to give a tiny shiny shit about doing housework. I enjoy dressing up and wearing makeup on special occasions but mostly go through life in jeans and t-shirt and no makeup. I put the bins out, DH does most of cooking. In short I don't really 'fit' female stereotypes but I am nonetheless a woman. I'm not more of a woman when I'm in heels and a dress than I am when I'm in jeans and a football shirt.

And toilets?

On the fence re toilets (except in feral schools)

Well, sisters, it’s been interesting but I’ve spent far too much time here today. I’ve asked for the thread to be deleted, purely because I’ve shared more personal details than I’m comfortable with. Thank you to those who were constructive and thoughtful. An emotive topic.

Please don’t request the thread is deleted !
It has a wealth of information that those of us (me) less educated can learn from.

I urge you to think about how particularly disabled people, medically vulnerable people and girls and women are going to be put at a disadvantage by mixed sex toilets. Why are ‘feral’ schools (poor? State? FSM?) different to others? Do they get single sex loos or are they for the rich kids?

You should know better having been a teacher.

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/education/drug-dealing-drinking-dirt-problems-28517175

I really wish MNHQ would simply edit/delete any specific posts rather than remove the whole thread.

You could try saving some posts, that might work.

I'm also disappointed that FlemishHorse is having the thread deleted because i did genuinely want to know more about the thinking behind this:

I think it’s perfectly possible that some humans that present as men have “a sense of self” as female. I’m happy to accept that they are females, who have suffered a genetic/hormonal accident in their early development. And accept them with sympathy as women.