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]

Is it still just the six of us?

I've been AWOL alot recently so down to 5.386.

I'm never sure if the 6 refers to the number of us on MN or in the whole world.

They say talking to yourself is the first sign of madness, does this apply to MN posts too?

Crikey

are you ok?

I mean as noted above by Alison, rather than taking umbridge you could just….yanno…chat on this chat board

I am interested to talk about sex based vs gender based behaviour but you don’t seem to want to

My son went through a phase when he was struggling with his social identity and thought that he might be transgender. I am very fortunate that we have a good relationship and he felt able to talk to me about it.

He was going through puberty; autistic and socially awkward. He struggled to make friends and felt alienated from his peer group. Text book stuff actually.
He felt more of an affinity with the girls in his school cohort; felt they were kinder, nicer to him and less aggressive in manner. He started to think that as he was ‘less aggressive’, ‘more caring’ etc then he was obviously female. He felt that he had a lot more in common with them.

We talked it through a lot. I know it could have had vastly different consequences but he’s 28 now, gay and happy in his skin.

Gender is just a social construct. There is no behaviour or action that is exclusively ‘male’ or ‘female’

I'm so glad it turned out well for your son. What he went through is what worries me about the prevalence of genderist ideology among young people. The vulnerable ones are being socially pressured into developing these beliefs about themselves.

Yes, if I had encouraged him and taken him to the doctor he might have been swept up in the ideology.
Fortunately I have always been gender critical and firmly believe that sex is biological and immutable.
Hopefully post Cass we are heading in the right direction? Might be wishful thinking.

I wonder if the tide is starting to turn, at least in the UK. This is one of the reasons I enjoy mumsnet so much. The GC movement is much more advanced in the UK than across the pond.