So what exactly is gender?

[XChrome]

I'm still waiting for [redacted], to explain in depth what gender is. According to many people, it's a feeling, a self-perception, which they are labelling as gender. My question would be; how do the people who are using this label for a feeling know that the label they are giving it is accurate? How do they know it's not just the result of being socialized into believing certain feelings or interests signify that one is the gender that society has deemed corresponds to those feelings and interests?
I genuinely want to know, because I have never had this feeling in my life. I can perceive only my biological sex. I have always regarded my self-perception as the result of my individual personality and experiences, not about either gender or biological sex. However, many of those experiences are sex specific, so biological sex does play into it in that sense.

Can anybody answer this question about what gender is? Can you describe the feeling and explain how you know what it signifies? Please note that this is not a goading post. I'm not looking for an argument, just an explanation.
Thanks.

[Post edited by MNHQ to remove tag]

I’m guessing that someone’s gender is only an issue if they don’t like the sex that they are. If you’re ok with the sex that you are, then the issue of gender doesn’t arise and you can profess not to understand what gender is all about.

I suggest that gender is performative: stranded alone on a desert island, the issue of one’s gender would be immaterial.

No, they are just saying that they comply with the stereotypes or those of the opposite sex. They think this is important. Apparently it is important to them, but most of us aren't interested.

I don't think they are saying that though. They say it's something much more innate and deep and meaningful than mere stereotypes - but they can't say what that something is!

I haven’t seen much of the above happening but I have met Americans who, when I tell them I’m from Scotland, say to me “Hey, I’m Scahttish too!” - meaning their great great grandad emigrated from Scotland to the US and they’ve not even been to the country. But apparently they self-identify as Scottish. They are not Scottish.

But in making this judgment (which presumably is not based only on what it says on their birth certificate?) you are accepting that Scottishness is not just a legal status, but that it's connected among other things to how you speak and where you live?

In other words you're accepting the existence of whatever the equivalent of "gender" is for nationality - some sort of nebulous feeling?

I would love a definitive answer to the gender and gender identity question. If we are going to upend society and make laws based on this concept it has to be properly defined and to have criteria for it, it cannot just be based on some nebulous feeling that differs from person to person or changes whichever way the wind is blowing.

There's nobody with more pride in being of Irish descent than Americans on St. Patrick's day. I always suspected there might be an element of white supremacism in that.
St. Patrick's Day is celebrated by people of Irish descent elsewhere in the world, but only in America does there seem to be such a fervor and outsized sense of pride in it.

But are they Irish? And if not why not?

Gender is the normative behaviour and appearance associated with biological sex. The feminist urge to suppress the fact that men and women behave differently has been a disaster. And YES OF COURSE THERE ARE EXCEPTIONS

Not to me. Perhaps they have a nebulous sense of being Irish or whatever, similar to the feeling of being male or female? I don't know. I'm Canadian because it's where I live and the culture I've grown up in. If I ever move to Ireland and assimilate into that culture, then I'll be Irish. That's how I feel about it.

If I ever move to Ireland and assimilate into that culture, then I'll be Irish.

There's a very good analogy here with people claiming to have a gender different from their sex.

In as much as it's a coherent concept, I would say that it's how human sexual dimorphism is enmeshed and reflected in culture.

So it's not static, and there can be arbitrary elements that emerge for historical reasons, but at the same time it's not completely separable from sex. So even where there is an arbitrary distinction it emerges because we see the sexes as both distinct and significant - we care about it. Other distinctions may be more closely related to sex itself so we can see patterns across cultures.

Of course individuals's relation to cultural expression can vary, but I think it's meaningless to say our internal gender doesn't match cultural gender.

Males are more likely to engage in rough play, they’re more likely to be risk takers, aggressive and sociosexual. This is gendered behaviour. It is not sexed behaviour. Because not all males are like that; it is typically masculine, it is gender. The complete resistance to the fact that certain behaviour and expressions are associated with males and others are associated with females- and that this is gender - has created so much confusion.

If there are enough exceptions, then it's no longer the norm. "It's normative, except in 50% (or whatever percentage) of cases" would be gibberish.
List these allegedly normative behaviours and give us some statistics on them to prove they are the norm. Do you mean, for example men being entitled, selfish and abusive towards women ONLY THERE ARE EXCEPTIONS OF COURSE? Is it that kind of "normative" behaviour you refer to?

Feminists in fact are the ones pointing out differences in behaviours. We're just saying they are not necessarily pre-ordained and inevitable.

And that is why the feminist saying goes:

Women are oppressed because of their biology, and gender is the way it's done.

Gender is the recognition that whilst you are born a certain sex, you can identify in a more fluid way.

The key difference being that a Canadian can move to Ireland.

Yeah, well that's not how they explained it originally.

Originally it absolutely was all about stereotypes. I cry at films, I can be more vibrant with colourful clothes, I can't do maths.

And when women pointed out the absurd sexism, it changed to something innate, that guess what, can't actually ever be described

This is interesting to me because of something I have noticed from certain people, who I suspect could cross over with people who are into the idea of gender:

Several times I have been involved in a discussion around history/ethnicity where someone mentioned either being English or being French, and some person buts in very self-righteously that anyone can be English and people are such bigots they think people whose ethnicity is Indian (for example) aren't "really" English?

It seems like such people aren't quite able to comprehend that as well as being a nationality in the modern sense, there could be such a thing as an English or French (German, Italian...) culture which is real and distinct and maybe most importantly has a historical existence and integrity. In their mind, anyone can become English in every real sense, and to dispute this in any context is racist.

What I find very confusing is that it doesn't seem to work the other way round for such people, I can't go off to live in India and claim to be Indian and might even be guilty of appropriation if I tried.

So I do wonder if there are people for whom the nature of categories of identity seem very confused. It strikes me as a language comprehension issue.

Yeah, the difference being that I actually can physically move to Ireland, and if I spend enough time there to become assimilated, I'll have had many experiences that are unique to living in Ireland. I'll even develop an accent, because some people do experience accent contagion when they've lived somewhere for awhile.
If somebody can tell me the same is true about gender, I might be able to buy into it.

The feminist urge to suppress the fact that men and women behave differently has been a disaster.
When have feminists ever done this ?
Feminist equality is about both sexes being able to do what the hell they want without gender role based restrictions.

This is not a mystery.

They are not, ethnically, American. Their ancestry is Scottish, in the same way the ancestry of another American might be Dutch, Irish, Italian, African, Cherokee, Spanish, or French.

These differences have regional distinctions within North America as well as even with regions and families. A family with English heritage might have a quite different set of Christmas traditions than a Dutch or Ukrainian family.

You can think of it as being similar to a British citizen telling you her family is Ghanaian, even if she, and maybe her parents, were all born in the UK.

Haven't you ever come across feminist who claim all behavioral differences between the sexes are socially constructed? And therefore illegitimate? There are definitely people who think that way.

Miriam Webster (American) includes transwomen in it's definition of woman, and I wouldn't trust it at all. It's like the Wikipedia of the English Language.
The OED (English) does not. It also doesn't have that guff about "woman/man" being about social gender blah blah....

So, the fact that there is variation among individuals doesn't mean that something is socially constructed.

If it did, we would have to say that average height differences between the sexes are socially constructed, since not all men are not taller than all women, in fact there is plenty of variation.

Exactly. Plus it's a culture which is not that different (and I have it in my ethic background, thus I have many of the same cultural practices) so assimilation would be easy. It would be a lot more difficult for me to feel I was, for example, Saudi or Chinese because I have no prior experience with those cultures. Assimilation would probably not be possible. Gender, as it is being defined now, is a lot like culture. Is it possible, for example, to truly give up the privileges of of being male? As a Canadian, I am also privileged. For example, I would have to give up democracy to live in China or Saudi Arabia.