Can we be "Sex realist" now? Not "Gender critical"?

[DiamondThrone]

I feel like we've been boxed into a corner. Being defined by "gender", when what we are actuall defined by is "sex", not womany feels.

The problem, for us, about trans ideology is that it hasnt a core belief.

One of the core beliefs is that there exist gender identities that match, or align with, one sex or the other.

It is unclear whether this implies, for example, that 'woman' gender matches with 'female'. I would like to see it made clear, by people who believe this, which gender identities match which sex.

Agreed.

And the really insidious thing about gender is that it works inside your own mind as well. It's not just society telling girls "doesn't matter if you enjoy it and are really good at it, you won't be as good as the boys and it's not for you anyway, girls are for other things", it's that our self images are formed within that gender soup as well, so it means many girls never even think of trying, or believe themselves it's not for them.

Kids learn about the world by living in it and by being taught. Of course they pick up the genderised messages and lives they see all around them as "real" rather than recognising they are just "the way things happen to have turned out". They need adults to help them understand what can exist outside their lived experience.

That is fine. Women is also fine.

I really couldn't give a fig what people choose to call themselves or others, it's entirely bloody immaterial.

Those who don't supoprt women's rights have been calling us names for years. It belies a weakness in argument when it gets to ad hom attacks, and worrying too much about what they'll call us, or what we or others want to call themselves, is pointless distraction.

Same with flags. I fucking hate flags.

People already, somehow, confuse being gender-critical with 'biological essentialism' even though they're the polar opposite. I think 'sex realist' sounds, superficially at least, even more like this, which is another reason I think it's not a useful term.

At least 80% of British people think that sex is determined at conception, and can't be changed, only disguised. We don't have a word for this, because it wasn't previously needed.

And it wouldn't matter, if it were not for the data falsification, unsafe medical practices, arrogation of cross-sex sex-based rights, etc. All of this was imposed on us by UKGOV and ECtHR, and none of it was needed to protect trans people from discrimination. It's these legal and institutional structures we're against, not trans people.

How about 'GRA abolitionists'? Although, more is needed now. It should be illegal to conceal your sex, or to facilitate the medical 'transition' of anyone under twenty-five.

I generally describe myself as "pro women" or say that I "support women".

It isn't a synonym for gender critical, or for sex realist, but it is the foundation of my feminism. Of course, some people use "women" to include "trans women", but in the context I use it (e.g. discussion of feminism, or "anti-trans") it is pretty clear what I mean, enough for them to argue about it!

Hello everyone. Thanks for the interesting discussion.

I guess I was trying to get at this - they are beginning to realise that "gender" hasn't worked. In the sense that #twaw didn't work. #nodebate didn't work. #bekind didn't work.

After the supreme court ruling, which said that for the purposes of the Equality Act people are defined by their biological sex - they are coming after that. We have gone beyond "gender". They are now saying that taking hormones, and altering your body, alters your biological sex. They are saying that they have female brains, therefore are biologically female. That taking oestrogen makes your blood feminine.

This may be on the extreme edge, for now. But you can bet that it's the new frontier. And we have to be ready for it.

They are saying that they have female brains, therefore are biologically female. That taking oestrogen makes your blood feminine.

They've been saying that for years. This isn't new.

This whole movement has been built by men claiming to have lady brains. That's what transgenderism is all about. What did you think they've been saying for the last 10-15 years?

They were saying that way before the SC ruling.

Glad to hear it. But I am sensing a new way of doing it. Calling themselves "biological women".Saying their DNA changes. That their blood changes gender with hormones.

Even if you don't agree with me, just keep an ear open for it.

Yes, they try to redefine words. It doesn't mean I'm going to give them up. I don't think it will help to 'retreat' linguistically. I know what I mean by gender and I am opposed to it. To be honest, 'feminist' should be enough.

Some people say the earth is flat. Doesn't mean it is.

Why are we supposed to be concerned about idiots spouting unscientific nonsense?

Are you concerned that people will believe them if they shout loudly enough?

But in saying that their DNA changes, they are truly talking nonsense, and it is verifiably nonsense.

Whereas saying they “change gender” is harder to refute because gender lacks a single meaning and its meaning has been deliberately fudged and blurred until no one is sure if they really mean sex, or something more nebulous. So they have got away with talking bollocks by using unclear language.

I think if they are pushed onto the ground of having to claim to change sex, more people can see that this simply isn’t true. It is sort of forcing the debate to be couched in more precise and accurate words that have a concrete defined meaning, eg sex, DNA, which is better for those of us rooted in reality.

“Gender” is a slippery word because it is used in at least three ways, and if the speaker doesn’t clarify the sense in which they are using it, it enables people to vaguely agree while every person in the room takes away a different meaning from “ I have changed gender”.

But “I have changed sex” is way less ambiguous and just makes the speaker sound delusional.

Yes I've seen this "well obviously I'm a biological woman claim". They claimed there were a few different ways to distinguish sex and then went through them discrediting each one except "hormone sex" 🙄🙄🙄

The term gender critical seems to have reached irreversible momentum, so that it seems unlikely that it will be dislodged as the antipole of GI. But I do think it's worth fighting to reclaim gender. Gender was up until recently a synonym for sex, e.g. you could talk about the gender of a connector (socket or plug), or of a goose or gander. The introduction of gender in a technical sense, e.g. a role you perform, is a postmodernist abuse of language, it tries to project a retroactive meaning in order to derive new interpretations of the existing usage, with Butler famously codifying it.

The introduction of the concept would have been mostly harmless if a new word or phrase had been coined for it, say sexual persona. But by giving a word with a material connotation a metaphysical definition all manner of sophistry and misdirection could be invoked. To me, that's why it's important to insist that I don't believe in gender - it's simply that gender = sex.

The introduction of gender in a technical sense, e.g. a role you perform, is a postmodernist abuse of language, it tries to project a retroactive meaning in order to derive new interpretations of the existing usage, with Butler famously codifying it.

I thought this use of the word 'gender' was the same as in 'gender stereotypes'. It was already in use well before Butler. The difference is that it was accepted that gender stereotypes were imposed by society. We don’t have a choice about them, but we can choose to go against them, although they will always be there in the background with the associated disapproval coming from some quarters if we do so.

The postmodernist idea that by going against gender stereotypes people somehow 'become' a different gender is just bonkers. Even more insane is the idea that by adopting the stereotypes imposed on the opposite sex people actually change sex.

It's true that the term 'gender' had already been used before Butler, especially: Money, Stoller and Rich. But most of Butler's sources and influences didn't use the term gender in a technical sense; notably Foucault, de Beauvoir, Kristeva, Irigaray, Lacan and Wittig all used different terminology in discussing ideas about femininity and masculinity, sex and stereotypes. Butler brought it all under the term gender and codified it. That's of course a bit of an over-simplification, but I don't think her contribution can't be over emphasized.

To your point - pre-Butler it would have been quite normal to find the term 'sex stereotypes' along side 'gender stereotypes' with no universally accepted distinction. Only after Butler did it become widely accepted that gender was a personal attribute separate from sex and thus an identity. It's also worth pointing out that Butler's Gender Trouble itself doesn't go that far. It's main thesis is that gender is something one does, it's a composite of one's performances - which implies that it's not a fixed identity.

Yes please OP

It's brilliant sunlight.

Most people will baulk at the notion of the female penis.

Thanks, that's really useful. I was considering reading one of Butler's books the other day for better context, but perhaps something that sites it within other feminist discourse might be more productive and less infuriating.

Could you rec a good, relatively objective text?

I just used google's ngram to see what terms have been used historically, and this backs up what you've said. From the 60s until the early 80s, 'sex stereotype' was the preferred term, then it switched to 'gender stereotype'. So for most of my adult life, 'gender stereotype' has been more commonly used (which is why I viewed it as the standard term). People seem to have become much more squeamish about using the word 'sex' in this sort of context.

I had a helpful Women's Studies 101 type book back in the 90s, I'll try and find it. It will be a useful view about how these ideas were seen pre-TRA revisioning.

We're "anti rights campaigners" now, apparently 🙄

https://tacc.org.uk/2025/07/14/calling-them-what-they-are-anti-rights-campaigners-not-womens-rights-defenders/

They're just flailing around trying to find mud to throw, but all they have is hot air.

"From exclusionary definitions of womanhood in healthcare and law, to attacks on inclusive safeguarding practices in prisons, schools, and shelters, the long-term effect of this anti-trans lobbying is to strip away legal recognition and practical support for all women".

You have to feel sorry for them. There's no fake news they won't use in a frantic attempt to persuade others that women's rights to safety & privacy from men and safeguarding children is somehow bigoted and unreasonable. 😂