A spectrum of stupidity

[proximalhumerous]

I'm not a scientist, but I am struck by what appears to me the profound illogicality of people stating that sex is a spectrum.

Are people (intentionally or otherwise) confusing all members of a group not being identical (i.e. having differing hormone levels, etc.) with there not being a clear binary of gamete-producing pathways?

I've just read this utter twaddle on the website of the Crab Museum in Margate:

"Today the Supreme Court voted to exclude a group of persecuted people from equality legislation. Their ruling centred on the word "biology", with the judge stating that biological sex is "assumed to be self-explanatory and to require no further explanation." Speaking in a professional capacity as museum of biology: this is not how biology works.

There are no binaries in nature, and biology, like all sciences, should never be taken for granted or assumed to be "self-explanatory". Even worse, it should never be used to justify weaponised culture war issues. This ruling is an abuse of science.

We have spoken many times before about this - there is immense variation between individuals within a biological sex. Biological sex itself (not just gender) is a spectrum - and it really shouldn't be a big deal.

If you don't like trans people then just be honest about your prejudices. But don't use biology to support your views in the same way that racists do.

Our trans siblings must be defended at all costs. If we allow the limitation of their rights then other minorities won't be far behind.

Maybe you'll be next?"

Nobody is excluded from equality legislation, surely?

Speaking as museum of biology? What does that mean, exactly?

No binaries in nature? Really?

Trans people must be defended "at all costs"??

I mean some backlash was inevitable, but how can so-called biologists be so deluded?

Agree, if they understood the difference which their general level of science education suggests they wouldn’t!

Or if being gamma-irradiated was touted as “gender-affirming care” they’d demand it free on the NHS no matter how harmful.

I very much doubt most people who say they identify as trans have seen their chromosomes either. So exactly why am I supposed to doubt everything about myself yet take their unevidenced word that they're the opposite sex as gospel?

But which bit of their body tells them their gender, I wonder?
Now that the tide is turning, how many of them will quietly ditch their gender ID?

Strangely enough, you can't ditch your sex, although you can alter your body with cross sex hormones.

Another point: if being "intersex" is seen as proof of sex being a continuous spectrum like height, rather than as disorders / anomalies / medical conditions, then why would they result in infertility (around 100%, I believe, depending on your definition of what is intersex) and the need for hormone treatment and sometimes surgery? Surely any "normal" development that falls within a spectrum (especially in the middle of it) shouldn't require medical intervention?

Rather it's because these conditions are aberrations not fitting properly within the binary that they come with their associated problems.

Or to put it another way, where's the evolutionary advantage of something that makes organisms infertile? That can surely only happen if something has gone wrong. Any development that, if taken to its logical conclusion, would see a species die out, cannot simply be part of a normal spectrum.