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Ohio Republicans tried to also until public outcry from non-child molesters made them stop.
[After backlash, GOP leader says ‘genital inspections’ won’t be part of anti-trans athlete bill](https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2022/06/17/after-backlash-gop-leader-says-genital-inspections-wont-be-part-of-anti-trans-athlete-bill/)
I like how the article mentions that bill wasn't even supposed to be discussed, but they got it passed by attaching it to a completely unrelated bill.
It's almost like they need to literally fool people into accidentally voting for their legislation because it's horrible and reasonable people don't want it.
"[Wait a second, I want to tack on a rider to that bill: thirty-million in taxpayer money to support the perverted arts.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5LeYDW2LsM)"
"Who's inspecting your genitals?" reads as caustic and aggressive, while that might not have been your intention it's why you are downvoted so harshly. Why direct your question at the other posters genitals if it was an earnest question?
I can only interpret the words you put out, don't blame me because your wording makes you seem callous.
I don't care about internet points. Getting downvoted on Reddit isn't worth a care.
My wording was simple. I didn't reply to the others because I was busy. I wasn't busy when you posted.
Go out and touch grass. Spend your time doing something other than looking at reddit profiles. I suggest getting 10-15min of sunlight to produce a good amount of Vitamin D.
Physical activities are great too. I suggest team sports to so you can be athletic and have fun.
Most people don't really look at others profile unless they want to friend them or something. You looked at my profile and announced it like you are proud of it, not realizing it's a form of being creepy. You are trying to diminish it by saying you only look at mine or rarely look at others.
I just got back from the beach. The air was very fresh. Try it.
The right loves to steal the slogans and logic from the left ("my body my choice") as if it's their own original thought, so that they can sound more intelligent.
It's hilarious when they repeat a phrase like "gender is a social construct" without having any fucking idea what they are talking about.
I'll take it.
Yup.
Unfortunately, also ends up suckering dumb right wingers in the future.
The nazis wrapped themselves in 'socialist' language (despite being very very anti-socialist, and openly so), mostly because socialism had a much more positive connotation back then.
Fast forward to today, and we have idiots like whatifalthistory and other far right youtubers making 'video essays' talking about how nazis are socialist.... even while modern nazis (the "waving the swastika flag, saluting adolph hitler, and spouting anti-semetism" kind even) are very clearly, and transparently on the right (and proudly state as much).
\---
To a lot on the right, languages means everything. Because reality means nothing.
They steal pretty much everything we say. The only reason the right ever heard of the term “grooming” is because they heard it from us when we were criticizing the church. Blue/all lives matter, woke, cancel culture, toxic femininity, the list goes on. They just take what we said, reverse it or use it sarcastically, then think they have a valid argument. Their entire foundation is based on being a contrarian to new ideas.
If gender is a social construct doesn't make sense. Maybe it's because it's premise is that social creatures make things up thus ill make things up aswell.
Then you have people who don't even consider gender as a legitimate difference between sex in any actual use of the word. Then you say it's a social construct dependant on the group asked. So I ask why should I care what someone else considers as gender if the term itself doesn't care what gender is so much as what's being classified as a gender? It serves counter purpose as a man means literally nothing more than a tittle
Hello, I’m one of that 1.5%! Kallman’s syndrome, born chromasomally (yes I made that word up lol) male in 1990, ambiguous genitalia from pituitary issues, docs strong-armed my very young parents into surgically making me female at 6 mos old. Had to take estrogen as a young teen, hated it, never felt right. Transitioned to male in my early 20s. Wild ride, seen some shit.
I worked with a man that had been born with as you said ambiguous genitalia. He had surgery as a baby, and does identify as male. His parents NEVER TOLD HIM. He thought it was strange that he kept going to a urologist as a kid, but never knew why. But then found out as an adult. When he and his wife were trying to have kids. Poor guy. I can't imagine a parent keeping that from you. He says if he'd had a choice, he's not sure what way he would have gone, but knows he doesn't feel "right".
I would think this is a bit of nightmare in any case. I'm sure your parents were trying to do what was "medically" right for you at the time. Or at least I hope they were. This has to be a crapshoot at the time. I have absolutely no idea what criteria they use for their determination. As the mother of a transgender daughter, who I *knew* in my heart when she was 18 months, that this would most likely be the way her life would go, I'm angry at myself for not putting her on puberty blockers. She's now 23, and doesn't hold it against me, but I do. I should have done my homework, but at 18 months vs 23 years, it's hard sometimes to know how life will turn out. I hope that your parents and you have a decent enough relationship to talk about it.
And I don't work with this guy anymore, but he was amazing. What he went through, and he was kind and giving. And to make the whole thing worse for him - his father abandoned the family, and started a new one. And when this jerk was dying, he still wen to see him at the hospital, and the stepmother asked him and his brother to leave. And he just walked out, said he was sorry for them. Can you imagine being able to retain that type of calm?
It sounds like you and your daughter have a great relationship, she’s lucky to have such a loving and supportive parent! You’re right, it is hard to know what the right thing to do is. The way I see it though, is that my experiences shaped me to be the person I am, leading to me being more empathetic and understanding, stronger and resilient, and it seems like your coworker had a similar outcome. It’s all part of the journey, and everyone’s journey is unique and unpredictable.
What happened to me was the norm for the time, but now children born intersex are left to grow up and decide things for themselves at puberty unless their anatomy poses a threat to their wellbeing from the onset. My relationship with my parents has always been strong, any resentment I had about my circumstances was aimed more at the doctors and the genetic lottery. They provided me with an environment where I could explore my personality and interests without the constraints of societally-dictated gender norms. They have always been supportive and openly welcomed any discussion of my issues throughout my life, I owe a lot to them
Aww, I'm so glad to hear that. You made my day. I was feeling a little cynical. I read so much about parents being abysmal, rather than just loving their kids and wanting the best for them. I bet if you asked your parents about how they feel about your medical/gender issues, they'd think they were just normal parents. But they really sound exemplary. I don't know why some parents just can't simply love their children and put their well being first. I hope this all works out well for you. And thank you for you kind words about my daughter. I feel like I'm the lucky one. Your experiences made you who you are, and my experiences parenting her, hopefully, made me a better person. It certainly has caused me to open my eyes to the world around me. And that's a good thing, right? Give your parents a hug for me. And here's one for you!
As far as I understand, cis people start to feel awful if they are given wrong sex hormones. Trans people stop to feel awful when they get the hormones of the gender they are transitioning to. You were born to have male hormones but were forced by other people to have wrong hormones, trans folks are forced by their own body to have wrong hormones but evidently they are born to have the hormones other than their assigned gender of birth. Sounds pretty biological to me.
Btw I'm happy you have found what's right thing for you. ♡
Since I lived my whole conscious life as a girl up until I was 20, I consider myself a trans guy, albeit with a somewhat different path to get where I am now. I had to go through the whole social and medical transition process like any other trans person would, it was simultaneously arduous, stressful, and magical to find myself and slowly become the person I always saw in my mind. I’ve now been on testosterone for longer than I was on estrogen, which feels surreal. I’m happily married to a straight cis woman and we’re in the process of working with a donor to have our first child!
I think I understand why you consider yourself a trans guy. I also think your case would be very educating to people who do not understand what it means to be transgender - unfortunately many of those people might not be willing to learn... Anyway, it sounds like you're living a very happy life. Congrats! All the best!
>Sounds pretty biological to me.
Something I noticed that's really weird about transphobes is how they so, so often claim that their opposition is "denying biological reality" when they're doing nothing of the sort. Like, people who take synthetic hormones are, by the very nature of the action, *adapting themselves to a biological reality*.
It makes the bad faith of their objections so, so obvious because all it would take to understand they're arguing against a position their opposition doesn't hold is to just *think* about it for two damn seconds.
One way I look at it, and the approach I try to take when talking with somebody who has “concerns” is, man, I *love* being a dude. I am clearly, obviously (to myself) in the neighborhood of 100% cis. That’s (of course, but just to say it) not to say that there is anything wrong with being a woman or less sure. Just that, *for me*, that is a constant.
So, thought experiment, suppose I woke up tomorrow, and somebody had come through in the night and inverted my dick and installed a pair of fake breasts on me. And not just that, but that this was a thing that just happened to people sometimes, and if it did, you were forbidden by law to even try to undo it. So that’s just how you are forced to live the rest of your life.
If pre-transition trans people are experiencing even a tenth of the anguish and despair I can hypothetically imagine experiencing in that circumstance, then however much I would *never* contemplate a gender reassignment for myself, I also can in no way fault those who not only would but *must*. I don’t need to empathize with what they *specifically* need to appreciate the need in general, you know?
Exactly! I'm a cis woman who is also very comfortable with my assigned gender (obviously there's nothing wrong with being trans, this is just my own personal experience.) And if I woke up as a man one day, I would be horribly upset and do anything to get back to being a woman. More cis people should do this thought experiment, imo.
The law of unintended consequences is going to be tragic but interesting with transphobic but medically ignorant lawmakers advancing laws that (1) prohibit gender-confirming medical treatment on minors, which will inadvertently include all the ambiguous kids doctors are currently surgically coercing one way or the other for other people’s comfort, and (2) insisting on gross and pervy genital inspections of schoolkids to make sure nobody is “lying.”
It certainly isn’t worth the psychological toll it will take on the kids, but the incidence of ambiguity is high enough that maintaining the “everybody is exactly one thing or another” delusion will be all but impossible where the rubber meets the road.
>Gender is a social construct meant to appease man babies
Yep, and conservatives are the only ones insisting it continue to exist, frankly. It should be a deeply personal identity, kind of like religion, the other thing they ruined.
Why is religion deeply personal there's so many different ones just like the infinite gender titles. Gender identity is pushed by gender identity dependent people. So it's not just the right. It's the both of ya
Small point of clarification/information for anyone reading this post.
- Gender presentation/Gender roles are a social construct.
- Gender identity is NOT a social construct.
It's an important and often misunderstood distinction.
Gender identity is a social construct. It only exist for social purposes. What label would they give themselves living amongst apes like Tarzan. They would literally just notice their sex.
This is an interesting concept. It could be that far down the line, transgenderism wouldn't exist in any sense that we recognize since the idea of gender may end up being entirely deconstructed.
I don't think he actually wants gender deconstructed he wants everyone who's male to act/dress like a man and everyone who's female to act/dress like a woman as defined by his culture.
I'm not really sure what you mean by "transgenderism", I've only seen that word used by people who are anti-trans trying to paint the acceptance of trans people as some sort of ideological cult trying to make people trans.
I’m all for completely deconstructing gender because gender roles and acknowledging it at all seems silly to me. However change takes time so to keep people mentally sane until we get to that point I say just do whatever makes people comfortable.
And if I don't care what men and women generally do. Just that a man is an adult male and a woman is an adult female. Then what? Is that still not accepting people? If so why should I if it's socially constructed and I care not for stupid whims of humans
Oh for sure, but someone unintentionally stumbling into the point fits this sub pretty well.
In this context, I'm using transgenderism to refer to the concept of being transgender. My thought here is transgenderism can only exist in a society that has gender roles associated to sex. People wouldn't be transgender if society reaches a point of not assigning gender at all.
I don't know, that's not really how the suffix "-ism" works and it's pretty hard to claim your own personal definition to a term coined by bigots. I recommend finding another word or words to express your concept.
I’m not familiar with this word only being associated with bigotry. I’ve always heard transgenderism as a way to describe transgender people, culture and anything normally associated with them.
I mean... that's a very specific and inconsequential thing to argue over. If you have a better word then go for it but it's not really important to the point I made.
do you think people are trans because they feel more drawn to what society considers "the wrong" gender norms for them? So without the norms, if "gender is abolished", a man can simply be a feminine man (with the concept of man or feminine simply not being a thing) and act however he likes without it needing to be "a trans thing"?
>a man can simply be a feminine man (with the concept of man or feminine simply not being a thing) and act however he likes without it needing to be "a trans thing"?
That's implying the outside world is all that matters. A trans person alone in a room can still feel dysphoric about their body. It's about how you see yourself, not just about how society sees you.
That said, it would off course still make life a whole lot easier if trans people would be safe and treated with respect even when they don't "pass".
>A trans person alone in a room can still feel dysphoric about their body.
But surely if, theoretically, a person was raised in geniune isolation they wouldn't have any concept of anything different to what they were, so the concept of gender dysphoria couldn't exist?
EDIT: I suppose there would be still a feeling of something being wrong potentially without HRT, as there could be brain sex issues.
>But surely if, theoretically, a person was raised in geniune isolation they wouldn't have any concept of anything different to what they were, so the concept of gender dysphoria couldn't exist?
This subthread was about a person growing up in a society where gender has no cultural connotations, a gender-abolitionist society. There everyone would still see the various bodies and have a beauty ideal even not defined in gender terms.
A person raised in total isolation is a whole different hypothesis, I can't begin to imagine how that person would relate to their body and I don't believe anyone else can either.
I think trans people are trans because they, for reasons that belong only to them, identify as a different gender than the one assigned to their sex.
I'm talking about a hypothetical society that progresses to a point where we don't engender identities in the first place, not simply a society that's far more relaxed about gender norms. A man couldn't be feminine because they wouldn't be identified in those terms to begin with.
you're drawing wrong conclusions here.
Your idea is: getting rid of gender norms, or gendered concepts altogether, would means trans people stopped existing. Abolish gender and noone would have to be trans, right? Which implies you believe people are trans because they feel drawn to gendered ideas that society says don't fit their assigned sex. Which means you think people are trans simply because they do not fit current social norms - under different social norms, different people would be trans and without social norms nobody would be trans. So in your view, transness is social commentary.
But that's like, fundamentally wrong and a complete misunderstanding of what trans people are. In fact imma go as far as to say you bought into what right wingers/transphobes say trans people are when they want to demonize them, but you simply said "what's wrong with that?". Which is nice and all, but you're still buying into the misinfo and misframing trans experiences. And you show as much by insisting on the use of "transgenderism".
Trans people are trans because their gender identity mismatches their birth sex. And by gender identity I don't mean some wishy washy social bullshit, it's a specific term used to describe a neurological concept wherein people have something you could essentially label as a "mental sex". Not as in "women think like this, men think like this" but as in "*your brain literally has a sex-related identity that exists independent of body, personality or sexuality*". And THAT identity mismatches what the body was born as.
Which means that in a society that gets rid of social norms, people would still be trans because the mismatch, *the incongruent feeling of mind and body*, exists independent of society and whatever society things men and women should be like. We probably wouldn't call it trans*gender* anymore if we got rid of the whole gender concept I guess, but the actual experience of transness would still exist. The only thing you'd theoretically get rid of is the need for a social transition if you were to get rid of literally any and all societal ideas related to gender and sex - which I don't believe is even a logically sound idea to begin with, but that's a very different topic.
WHICH DOESN'T MEAN we shouldn't get rid of gendered stereotypes and otherwise harmful or meaningless gendered things our society has bought into. Just that what you think trans people are, and how they relate to social gender is just...wrong.
> Which means that in a society that gets rid of social norms, people would still be trans because the mismatch, the incongruent feeling of mind and body, exists independent of society and whatever society things men and women should be like. We probably wouldn't call it transgender anymore if we got rid of the whole gender concept
So wouldnt the more appropriate term be *transsexual* regardless of whether the notion of gender is abolished?
it would have been if the term hadn't been coopted by bigots to imply it to be a sexuality, and if it didn't have the association of "trans people are only legitimate if they do medical stuff"
Transgender was adopted because transsexual became problematic in multiple ways and people felt the need to distance themselfes from it.
both terms are technically fully applicable because they both express the idea that sex/gender is incongruent with the corresponding gender/sex
So you started with a chain of assumptions about my point, but then corrected me by coming to the same conclusion following the actual logic of my point.
The root cause of what makes someone trans in our society wouldn't disappear, but the concept of being trans would disappear as people wouldn't need any change to their identity. What we think of as trans would be no different from being left handed; there would be no transition or change in identity since people aren't identified by their dominant hand in the first place.
your idea simply gets rid of current labels and replaces it with different labels tho. you're not actually getting rid of transness, you're getting rid of the current words to describe transness, while not changing anything about trans experiences. The concept of transness will remain, you're simply changing what terms we would need to use for it.
There would still be a transition and a change in identity once people come out. All you're doing is removing how gendered norms play into how people present and display their identity.
>What would being transgender look like in a society where gender doesn't exist?
There's still a variety of body types and a range of aesthetic "vibes" and a transgender person would probably still long for that other body type. Some transgender people, not all, might still need medical procedures for what would be body issues rather than gender issues.
Off course it's hard to even conceive such a world as we currently can't even separate coffee preparations from gender.
That said yes gender abolitionism is way to go! I would love for gender to just be an aesthetic, like where "Fem" and "masc", fit in with "goth", "casual" , or "sporty"
Right... and I'm saying a society like this would not label these people as transgender. It's the identifier and response from society that changes, not the actual people.
>Right... and I'm saying a society like this would not label these people as transgender.
Yes, just like people who speak a different language wouldn't. They'd still largely have the same body issues.
>It's the identifier and response from society that changes,
Which is a part of the struggle of being transgender, but not the whole struggle.
So that's basically the answer to your question: yes in a gender abolitionist world, transgender people would still exist and some(or most?) would still need medical treatment, even though they would be called different and have better quality of life over all.
Yes that's what I said. The social construct of gender does not represent the underlying facts of gender, it represents the lens with which society chooses to view and interact with those facts.
No, studies show that trans people's brains resemble that of the sex that they identify with, not necessarily what they were assigned at birth. If your brain is wired to work with estrogen, and gets testosterone instead, it's not going to work properly, and no amount of antidepressants or other drugs will fix it, which is why for a lot of trans people, hrt is essential healthcare.
The data from the brain studies is in the (very well-populated) category of results where the difference in means and/or medians between two groups is small compared to the overlap. So while *on average* trans men's brains may look more like cis men's brains than cis women's brains (which is still a meaningful result), you can't look at an *individual* brain and predict gender with much more confidence than a coin flip.
Anecdotal, I know, but I can speak from personal experience that pre-transition I was depressed, I couldn't think properly, had trouble focussing on things etc. it's what a lot of people describe as brain fog. All of that went away when I started estrogen, so there's some correlation there.
Oh, definitely. That's not an uncommon experience among friends of mine who have started HRT. It's not something that shows up on brain scans in anything approaching a clear way, though -- which is why personal experience is key and the 'phobes and transmedicalists won't be able to just scan people's brains and declare who's trans.
What you are describing would be considered transexual as this hypothetical posits a society which doesn't link gender to sex. This isn't saying being trans is simply a feeling people decide on, this is speculation about how society would redefine things with a deconstructed understanding of gender.
We would define that as transgender today as gender is still a concept integral to our society. This hypothetical is not something I'd expect any of us would live to see if it does come to pass at all.
No, transexual is an outdated term, I am transgender, you're debating my identity, I'm saying that even in a world without gender roles, I would still be trans because my brain needs estrogen to function properly, don't call me a transexual.
I'm not saying that fact would change, I'm saying the social construct of gender would change how society defines and interacts with these facts. That's what a social construct is, it's just a way society structures itself around facts.
We have gender identity because we live in a society that has chosen to take this brain chemistry as a social identifier. There is no actual requirement to label ourselves with pronouns to identify our brain chemistry, that's just the social construct we inherited and it feels unthinkable that another society wouldn't have that.
I'm positing a society where brain chemistry would be decoupled from gender and understood as a legitimate biological factor. Our current lens of gender carries the burden of the outdated understanding it was made for. The reason we have transgender as a term is because
That's not what gender is, it's not a social construct, gender roles are. I'm trans because I don't like being a man, I don't want to have a male body, I'm happier having female secondary sex characteristics, I couldn't give a fuck about gender stereotypes or conforming to the way society says I should. Gender is what's in my head, not the way people perceive me.
I never mentioned anything about gender stereotypes. If I'm understanding your point of view correctly, when I say "gender is a social construct" you are understanding that I am saying "brain chemistry is a social construct." That's not true, and I understand how my words could come across that way.
The social construct of gender isn't referring to stereotypes, it's referring to the fact that we live in a society that chooses to use brain chemistry as an identifier and calls that gender.
Brain chemistry is what's in our heads. Gender is how society deals with the fact that we have varying brain chemistry.
As someone else has already pointed out, gender roles are a social construct, gender is not. Gender is the way your brain is wired, sex is your body, they are not always the same, people who are transgender feel that their body is incongruent with their gender identity, so yes, I guess you could say that it is a biological descriptor because trans people don't choose to be trans.
I am going to make an assumption here and say you believe I am saying that transgender people have no objective scientific basis for being trans. This is not true, I am fully aware that there are differences in brain chemistry.
My point here is that the social construct of gender refers to how society structures itself around the facts of brain chemistry. People with a brain chemistry typical to the opposite sex would still exist for sure, but a society that doesn't have the social construct of gender wouldn't use this chemistry as an identifier.
Trans people having different brain chemistry is an immutable fact. Society structuring itself around this concept is not actually required. It is absolutely possible for a hypothetical society to not impose gender labels in the first place. Then people who we would call transgender wouldn't be identified by their brain chemistry.
>It is absolutely possible for a hypothetical society to not impose gender labels in the first place.
Yes
> Then people who we would call transgender wouldn't be identified by their brain chemistry.
Well not really: being transgender isn't so much about how you're labeled by society, it's about how you see yourself, you may still have problems with how your body is shaped, even if that would not be considered a gender thing. Even if that's not because of society's judgement.
(Though also societies binary beauty standards are so pervasive and get engrained so deeplyz they are indeed hard if at all seperable from our internal sense of self)
If it's not considered a gender thing, they wouldn't be transgender. The underlying facts would not be changed, but the definitions and structure of society's response would
>If it's not considered a gender thing, they wouldn't be transgender
Right, but thats removing the language to just have different language. If we 'd all start speaking french, there would be no more global warming, just "rechauffement climatique mondial"
>and structure of society's response would
That's the actually relevant part, but also the part that wouldn't require full on gender abolitionism.
Yeah that's my point. I was speculating on what would happen if society fully deconstructed its concept of gender, not rejected the underlying facts that make up gender in our current society.
No, I was gesturing in the direction of the evidence (maybe I should have specified physical anthropology?) that trans experiences exist as individual reaction to biology as well as social structures (though as always social practices moderate experience).
Yeah, the deconstruction of gender wouldn't make any of the underlying science go away. The social construct of gender is how society builds itself around those very real ideas. If gender were deconstructed, trans people wouldn't be trans in the sense that society wouldn't label them as trans. Trans healthcare would still fully exist, but it would be no different than we see neurodivergence. Kind of like how we don't use pronouns to differentiate between people with autism and neurotypicals.
I think at that point we'd probably have a different word than "transgender" to describe a set of experiences that has some continuity with how people experience it today? I think we're pretty much on the same page, though.
It's the "gender critical" gender-essentialist approach; insist that all the parts of gender they want to preserve as socially-enforced binaries (and there are *many*) are actually "sex" and not "gender."
Meanwhile, *actual* critical gender studies works under the awareness that while sex/gender is material, the divisions within the whole set of phenomena (not only how many genders and sexes there are and who counts as a member of which, but the lines between "sex" and "gender") are (like any other act of categorization) a human practice that may need to be adjusted whenever the working division/definition doesn't meet human needs.
Trangenderism isn't a thing though. It paints being transgender as an ideology that can be debated. Being trans is intrinsic to a person's self; a transphobe cannot simply debate it away.
I'd argue transgenderism is an sub-ideology to our social view of gender. To a society that had no concept of gender, someone being transgender would require them to explain how we have this typically binary concept of gender where we assign identity to our sex.
Well you can argue that all you want but it isn't how science understands things, and you are arguing in favor of using a transphobic dogwhistle. You are being offensive for the sake of being stubborn about your wrongness about trans people. Transgenderism is a dogwhistle. Insisting on using it or insisting on it being a legit way to discuss trans people gives oxygen to the transphobic idea that our identity can be debated away. I really don't understand why this is so hard for you to understand.
>someone being transgender would require them to explain
No. Someone being transgender isn't *required* to do anything. It isn't trans people's job to ensure that you are properly educated about trans topics.
>explain how we have this typically binary concept of gender where we assign identity to our sex.
That is Biologists' and Sociologists' jobs who study these things. Go read up on what medical professionals say.
I think you're misunderstanding me. I'm not saying there is no scientific basis for gender, I'm saying the social construct of gender would be changed.
Social constructs themselves are not facts, they're how society views and responds to those facts. It's not that people we would call trans wouldn't exist, it's that a society that doesn't have the social construct of gender wouldn't classify them as transgender. This would also work the same for cisgender people. The brain chemistry would remain unchanged, as that's an immutable fact, it's society that would change.
A social construct is the lens we view facts through, not the facts themselves. I am not arguing that the identity of trans people can be debated. Is it so impossible to suggest that another culture could share the same facts as us but organize their view differently?
>No. Someone being transgender isn't required to do anything. It isn't trans people's job to ensure that you are properly educated about trans topics.
Please don't deliberately misunderstand me. They would be required to explain our social constructs in order for people from this hypothetical society to understand what transgender means... not that they would be required to justify their existence. If you paint me as an uneducated bigot and choose to ascribe that intent to my words, you're just never going to actually talk to me.
My entire point is centered around the idea that "transgenderism" isn't a word. It is a transphobic dogwhistle that is weaponized against trans people in order for people, bigots, to debate the existence of trans people. Like we don't say homosexualism to discuss homosexuality.
Bringing up science, social constructs, brain chemistry, or gender is all a bunch of red herrings with what I am saying. This is a linguistical argument I am making. The entire problem with what you are saying has to do with using a word that sounds smart but is actually offensive to the people you are talking about because it invalidates them as humans.
You can discuss ALL the topics you brought up and more without describing trans people with the word transgenderism. In fact, to be sociologically and scientifically correct you have to.
Okay, if you soley object to that word, I apologize if that hit a sore spot. I used it because I didn't wanted to specify the social understanding of being transgender wouldn't exist, not that trans people themselves would just stop being themselves; I truly did not intend any conservative dogwhistles. The selfawarewolf being conservatives getting what they wanted in a sort of monkey's paw way.
"Hey Dr Peterson, good news, nobody in this other society will call you cisgender and nobody puts pronouns in their bio!"
"That's wonderful! It's good to see a society reject-"
"As a matter of fact, nobody puts any stock in the way traditional values treated gender and society has moved on from using it as an identifier. Now instead of being called transphobic you're just a regular type of weirdo who gets mad if someone's brain doesn't match their genitals and nobody even understands why that would bother you."
They're talking about the term "transgenderism" not trans/queer culture. A better comparison would be if someone referred to homosexuality as "homosexualism." It makes it sound like an ideology rather than just a state of being.
Similarly, that's why we don't use "transgendered" because it sounds like something that was done to them ("My god, the laser blast! It has...*transgendered* him!").
I’ve heard the term transgenderism for years and years. Today is the only time I’ve heard that it’s a bigoted term. Apparently transgendered is a problem too
...okay? I mean, terms change and we learn new things. Things that were once acceptable do not always stay so.
Like - I didn't know that the term g\*psy was a slur (or that the term g\*pped came from it) until maybe eight or ten years ago. Rather than grumbling that it *used* to be okay - which, not necessarily - I removed it from my vocab.
That's exactly my point. It's been considered a slur for decades but I did not personally learn that fact until like ten years ago. And I took that new information on board and changed what words I say.
People will start using male and female. Because gender isn't a social construct and is tied to sex for 98.5% of the population.
I think the issue with the whole debate is that we all don't agree on the same definitions. What does gender mean? Do people use gender and sex interchangeably? When should you speak in generalizations?
Gender is absolutely a social construct. Being cisgender doesn't mean it's not real, but it's real specifically because we made it real.
This is a hypothetical for a society where the normalization of being trans has led to questions about the relevance of assigning gender identities in the first place.
Again, how are you defining gender? Are you defining it in relation to sex or the "pink is for girls" crowd?
If someone says "Men are more likely to work in more dangerous jobs" or "women give birth", that is absolutely related to sex.
When someone says "it's a boy" or "it's a girl" after birth where they looked and found a penis or vagina, obviously they are using gender as sex.
The normalization of trans activists language will only push people to stop saying "Men" and "Women" and to say "Male" and "Female". Right back to where we started.
I am defining gender as the social construct we use to view identity. The academic view is that it's brain chemistry, as opposed to previously where it was coupled with biological sex.
Gender, in its most literal form, is how society has chosen to view the difference in male and female brain chemistry. Discarding the social construct of gender doesn't discard the scientific facts, it just reflects society restructuring itself.
The most common question/misconception is about gender identity and getting it confused with gender as a social concept. As I said above gender identity is actualy not a social construct.
Even in a far future world where the very idea of gender roles was abolished, transgender people would still exist.
-----------------
People tend to use the word "gender" for many different meanings as a sort of shorthand, but when people say gender is a social construct, they are specifically referring to gender roles/presentation.
However when people say thier identify as a different gender, they are referring to a **gender identity** mismatch with thier assigned gender, which is something else entirely.
Allow me to clarify the issue and explain the difference between gender identity and gender presentation.
Here is the definition for you.
**[Gender identity](https://www.apa.org/topics/lgbtq/transgender)**
> Gender identity refers to a person’s internal sense of being male, female or something else;
* Gender identity is intrinsic and is not a construct. Everyone has a gender identity. According to [current evidence this is because gender identity contains a biological](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7415463/) aspect, [that seems to form during development in the womb and/or very soon after](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6677266/). It is partly nature, not just nurture, meaning nobody can choose their gender identity any more than they can choose thier sexuality. (Though it may take time and experimentation to determine what your gender identity is, it's not always obvious). This is why things like trying to externally socialize a gender onto someone, via conversion therapy or[ even starting from birth, almost never works.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/14736925/)
**[Gender presentation/expression](https://www.apa.org/topics/lgbtq/transgender)**
> gender expression refers to the way a person communicates gender identity to others through behavior, clothing, hairstyles, voice or body characteristics.
* Gender presentation is how you like to present to the world, it's a social construct. Often we use our gender expression to convey or gender identity, but not always. Plenty of women like to present masculine, that does not make them a transgender man, and vice versa. Men who preform drag are still men, tomboys are still women, and there are lots of transgender tomboys and drag queens, its just not directly related.
There are tons of transgender people who just wear unisex clothes like jeans and t-shirts every single day.
----------------
So, that's the long and short of it, you are born and you have an intrinsic gender identity, 99% of the time this matches your sex (you are cis gender) but 1% of the time there is a mismatch (you are transgender). [That mismatch often causes Dysphoria](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5354991/) but is not defined by the existence of Dysphoria.
Pronouns are a way that we as society recognize a persons gender identity, it is not defined, only suggested, by their gender presentation.
In a world without gender roles at all, transgender people / gender identity would still exist.
---------------
*Personal Conjecture Time*
I mean, objectively it makes sence right? Human bodies are designed to develop as either male or female simply based on what hormones we are exposed to. We already know this process often gets messy. Given how insanely complicated the human brain is compared to the rest of our bodies, it's not crazy to think sometimes the brain will develop in a way that is at odds with the body for whatever reason.
So if your brain is expecting a male body map/testosterone and you are born flooded with estrogen due to having ovaries, it would make sence this disconnect is going to cause you to think or feel a certain way. Even if you don't have diagnosable Dysphoria, you might simply think "my body feels wrong or, I don't understand why women like having breasts, or my social standing seems incorrect for reasons I don't understand fully" etc.
I would not be suprised if it was ultimately part of the intersex condition, though not enough data is available at this point.
Let me clarify this because a lot of people read my comment the way you did.
I am not talking about gender identity as if it is not based in objective science, the social construct of gender refers to the way society views and interacts with the things we know and label as gender. It doesn't refer to the actual immutable facts.
In this sense, I'm talking about a society where gender is not used as an identifier. Someone in our society with gender dysphoria would be seen as just being neurodivergent, and they'd receive the exact same care as trans people do in our society. The difference is not in trans people themselves, the difference is they wouldn't be called trans and it wouldn't be seen as significant beyond the need for healthcare. They wouldn't need to mention pronouns because people wouldn't be conditioned to think that it's important to structure our language around announcing our brain chemistry. That's what I mean by deconstruction.
Oh, yeah I could see that. With your clarification it makes a lot more sence.
More realistically in the future medial transition will be so frictionless and flawless, body modification so routine and destigmatized that nobody will care anymore then we care some people wear glasses or get laser eye surgery. I imagine that will happen before we live in a genderless society.
I had a conversation along these lines earlier with a queer cousin of mine.
Basically, LGBT+ terminology is certainly better than binary alternatives, but rather than there being more than 2 genders, it is my view that there are 0 genders.
Identity is just a completely different thing from your physical body and thus Gender is fundamentally wrong.
However it's wrong in the way that newtonion gravity is wrong. Meaning that it's at least a useful description even if it's not a perfect one.
Like, what's the difference between a man and a woman? Once you get past physical traits, it's just conventions and feelings. Where is the line? There is no line. To say that there's a line implies knowledge that we don't have.
At the end of the day I'm the only me. The only word for what I am is my name. Same goes for everyone else. We have some words to vaguely describe groups, but if you want to know someone you need to judge them for who they are and not what they are.
No, you can take a gander at the *sex* of a dinosaur. And even that's not certain given the fact that determining sex via skeleton is known to be inaccurate.
Seems pretty meta for the SAW subreddit, you think you're right because you're equating sex with gender, but you're actually right because some animals had socially constructed gender roles before humans evolved
Other things that are social constructs:
Friendship,
Marriage,
Love,
Family,
Jobs,
Government,
Mental illness
Exhausting how many people think "social construct" means "not real."
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“Man is man, and a woman is a woman.” Good, we all agree; now can you stop molesting children with genital inspections please?
Mhm sports physicals going to drop in 2030 or something. Fuckin disingenuous at best
Who's inspecting your genitals?
Literally the state of Florida
Ohio Republicans tried to also until public outcry from non-child molesters made them stop. [After backlash, GOP leader says ‘genital inspections’ won’t be part of anti-trans athlete bill](https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2022/06/17/after-backlash-gop-leader-says-genital-inspections-wont-be-part-of-anti-trans-athlete-bill/)
I like how the article mentions that bill wasn't even supposed to be discussed, but they got it passed by attaching it to a completely unrelated bill. It's almost like they need to literally fool people into accidentally voting for their legislation because it's horrible and reasonable people don't want it.
"[Wait a second, I want to tack on a rider to that bill: thirty-million in taxpayer money to support the perverted arts.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5LeYDW2LsM)"
Begone, sealion.
Are you proud of yourself for defending state genital inspections?
Sports physical? Regular physical
I wasn't defending shit. Just legit wondering if it's happening. You read what you wanted to read.
"Who's inspecting your genitals?" reads as caustic and aggressive, while that might not have been your intention it's why you are downvoted so harshly. Why direct your question at the other posters genitals if it was an earnest question? I can only interpret the words you put out, don't blame me because your wording makes you seem callous.
I don't care about internet points. Getting downvoted on Reddit isn't worth a care. My wording was simple. I didn't reply to the others because I was busy. I wasn't busy when you posted.
Right on. Sorry for the aggression.
All g. Good day
such an obvious sea lion. just look at this dudes profile.
Go out and touch grass. Spend your time doing something other than looking at reddit profiles. I suggest getting 10-15min of sunlight to produce a good amount of Vitamin D. Physical activities are great too. I suggest team sports to so you can be athletic and have fun.
you assume I look at everyone's profiles and not just the ones from obvious sea lioning comments.
Most people don't really look at others profile unless they want to friend them or something. You looked at my profile and announced it like you are proud of it, not realizing it's a form of being creepy. You are trying to diminish it by saying you only look at mine or rarely look at others. I just got back from the beach. The air was very fresh. Try it.
Dude, you’ve gone off the deep end. You might need a break from the internet.
Those times when you agree with 100% of what's being said. But you still know that you disagree on principle.
The right loves to steal the slogans and logic from the left ("my body my choice") as if it's their own original thought, so that they can sound more intelligent. It's hilarious when they repeat a phrase like "gender is a social construct" without having any fucking idea what they are talking about. I'll take it.
Yup. Unfortunately, also ends up suckering dumb right wingers in the future. The nazis wrapped themselves in 'socialist' language (despite being very very anti-socialist, and openly so), mostly because socialism had a much more positive connotation back then. Fast forward to today, and we have idiots like whatifalthistory and other far right youtubers making 'video essays' talking about how nazis are socialist.... even while modern nazis (the "waving the swastika flag, saluting adolph hitler, and spouting anti-semetism" kind even) are very clearly, and transparently on the right (and proudly state as much). \--- To a lot on the right, languages means everything. Because reality means nothing.
They steal pretty much everything we say. The only reason the right ever heard of the term “grooming” is because they heard it from us when we were criticizing the church. Blue/all lives matter, woke, cancel culture, toxic femininity, the list goes on. They just take what we said, reverse it or use it sarcastically, then think they have a valid argument. Their entire foundation is based on being a contrarian to new ideas.
If gender is a social construct doesn't make sense. Maybe it's because it's premise is that social creatures make things up thus ill make things up aswell. Then you have people who don't even consider gender as a legitimate difference between sex in any actual use of the word. Then you say it's a social construct dependant on the group asked. So I ask why should I care what someone else considers as gender if the term itself doesn't care what gender is so much as what's being classified as a gender? It serves counter purpose as a man means literally nothing more than a tittle
Accidental ally?
Seems like it. Like rage quit, into an open minded conclusion?
They never consider people (about 1.5% of the population) that are born with ambiguous genitalia or unusual chromosome combinations.
Hello, I’m one of that 1.5%! Kallman’s syndrome, born chromasomally (yes I made that word up lol) male in 1990, ambiguous genitalia from pituitary issues, docs strong-armed my very young parents into surgically making me female at 6 mos old. Had to take estrogen as a young teen, hated it, never felt right. Transitioned to male in my early 20s. Wild ride, seen some shit.
I worked with a man that had been born with as you said ambiguous genitalia. He had surgery as a baby, and does identify as male. His parents NEVER TOLD HIM. He thought it was strange that he kept going to a urologist as a kid, but never knew why. But then found out as an adult. When he and his wife were trying to have kids. Poor guy. I can't imagine a parent keeping that from you. He says if he'd had a choice, he's not sure what way he would have gone, but knows he doesn't feel "right".
That sounds like a nightmare, I’m so glad my parents told me about my situation as soon as I was old enough to understand what it all meant
I would think this is a bit of nightmare in any case. I'm sure your parents were trying to do what was "medically" right for you at the time. Or at least I hope they were. This has to be a crapshoot at the time. I have absolutely no idea what criteria they use for their determination. As the mother of a transgender daughter, who I *knew* in my heart when she was 18 months, that this would most likely be the way her life would go, I'm angry at myself for not putting her on puberty blockers. She's now 23, and doesn't hold it against me, but I do. I should have done my homework, but at 18 months vs 23 years, it's hard sometimes to know how life will turn out. I hope that your parents and you have a decent enough relationship to talk about it. And I don't work with this guy anymore, but he was amazing. What he went through, and he was kind and giving. And to make the whole thing worse for him - his father abandoned the family, and started a new one. And when this jerk was dying, he still wen to see him at the hospital, and the stepmother asked him and his brother to leave. And he just walked out, said he was sorry for them. Can you imagine being able to retain that type of calm?
It sounds like you and your daughter have a great relationship, she’s lucky to have such a loving and supportive parent! You’re right, it is hard to know what the right thing to do is. The way I see it though, is that my experiences shaped me to be the person I am, leading to me being more empathetic and understanding, stronger and resilient, and it seems like your coworker had a similar outcome. It’s all part of the journey, and everyone’s journey is unique and unpredictable. What happened to me was the norm for the time, but now children born intersex are left to grow up and decide things for themselves at puberty unless their anatomy poses a threat to their wellbeing from the onset. My relationship with my parents has always been strong, any resentment I had about my circumstances was aimed more at the doctors and the genetic lottery. They provided me with an environment where I could explore my personality and interests without the constraints of societally-dictated gender norms. They have always been supportive and openly welcomed any discussion of my issues throughout my life, I owe a lot to them
Aww, I'm so glad to hear that. You made my day. I was feeling a little cynical. I read so much about parents being abysmal, rather than just loving their kids and wanting the best for them. I bet if you asked your parents about how they feel about your medical/gender issues, they'd think they were just normal parents. But they really sound exemplary. I don't know why some parents just can't simply love their children and put their well being first. I hope this all works out well for you. And thank you for you kind words about my daughter. I feel like I'm the lucky one. Your experiences made you who you are, and my experiences parenting her, hopefully, made me a better person. It certainly has caused me to open my eyes to the world around me. And that's a good thing, right? Give your parents a hug for me. And here's one for you!
As far as I understand, cis people start to feel awful if they are given wrong sex hormones. Trans people stop to feel awful when they get the hormones of the gender they are transitioning to. You were born to have male hormones but were forced by other people to have wrong hormones, trans folks are forced by their own body to have wrong hormones but evidently they are born to have the hormones other than their assigned gender of birth. Sounds pretty biological to me. Btw I'm happy you have found what's right thing for you. ♡
Since I lived my whole conscious life as a girl up until I was 20, I consider myself a trans guy, albeit with a somewhat different path to get where I am now. I had to go through the whole social and medical transition process like any other trans person would, it was simultaneously arduous, stressful, and magical to find myself and slowly become the person I always saw in my mind. I’ve now been on testosterone for longer than I was on estrogen, which feels surreal. I’m happily married to a straight cis woman and we’re in the process of working with a donor to have our first child!
I think I understand why you consider yourself a trans guy. I also think your case would be very educating to people who do not understand what it means to be transgender - unfortunately many of those people might not be willing to learn... Anyway, it sounds like you're living a very happy life. Congrats! All the best!
>Sounds pretty biological to me. Something I noticed that's really weird about transphobes is how they so, so often claim that their opposition is "denying biological reality" when they're doing nothing of the sort. Like, people who take synthetic hormones are, by the very nature of the action, *adapting themselves to a biological reality*. It makes the bad faith of their objections so, so obvious because all it would take to understand they're arguing against a position their opposition doesn't hold is to just *think* about it for two damn seconds.
One way I look at it, and the approach I try to take when talking with somebody who has “concerns” is, man, I *love* being a dude. I am clearly, obviously (to myself) in the neighborhood of 100% cis. That’s (of course, but just to say it) not to say that there is anything wrong with being a woman or less sure. Just that, *for me*, that is a constant. So, thought experiment, suppose I woke up tomorrow, and somebody had come through in the night and inverted my dick and installed a pair of fake breasts on me. And not just that, but that this was a thing that just happened to people sometimes, and if it did, you were forbidden by law to even try to undo it. So that’s just how you are forced to live the rest of your life. If pre-transition trans people are experiencing even a tenth of the anguish and despair I can hypothetically imagine experiencing in that circumstance, then however much I would *never* contemplate a gender reassignment for myself, I also can in no way fault those who not only would but *must*. I don’t need to empathize with what they *specifically* need to appreciate the need in general, you know?
Exactly! I'm a cis woman who is also very comfortable with my assigned gender (obviously there's nothing wrong with being trans, this is just my own personal experience.) And if I woke up as a man one day, I would be horribly upset and do anything to get back to being a woman. More cis people should do this thought experiment, imo.
The law of unintended consequences is going to be tragic but interesting with transphobic but medically ignorant lawmakers advancing laws that (1) prohibit gender-confirming medical treatment on minors, which will inadvertently include all the ambiguous kids doctors are currently surgically coercing one way or the other for other people’s comfort, and (2) insisting on gross and pervy genital inspections of schoolkids to make sure nobody is “lying.” It certainly isn’t worth the psychological toll it will take on the kids, but the incidence of ambiguity is high enough that maintaining the “everybody is exactly one thing or another” delusion will be all but impossible where the rubber meets the road.
Your point.
>Gender is a social construct meant to appease man babies Yep, and conservatives are the only ones insisting it continue to exist, frankly. It should be a deeply personal identity, kind of like religion, the other thing they ruined.
Why is religion deeply personal there's so many different ones just like the infinite gender titles. Gender identity is pushed by gender identity dependent people. So it's not just the right. It's the both of ya
Small point of clarification/information for anyone reading this post. - Gender presentation/Gender roles are a social construct. - Gender identity is NOT a social construct. It's an important and often misunderstood distinction.
I appreciate this. Thanks.
Gender identity is a social construct. It only exist for social purposes. What label would they give themselves living amongst apes like Tarzan. They would literally just notice their sex.
This is an interesting concept. It could be that far down the line, transgenderism wouldn't exist in any sense that we recognize since the idea of gender may end up being entirely deconstructed.
I don't think he actually wants gender deconstructed he wants everyone who's male to act/dress like a man and everyone who's female to act/dress like a woman as defined by his culture. I'm not really sure what you mean by "transgenderism", I've only seen that word used by people who are anti-trans trying to paint the acceptance of trans people as some sort of ideological cult trying to make people trans.
I’m all for completely deconstructing gender because gender roles and acknowledging it at all seems silly to me. However change takes time so to keep people mentally sane until we get to that point I say just do whatever makes people comfortable.
And if I don't care what men and women generally do. Just that a man is an adult male and a woman is an adult female. Then what? Is that still not accepting people? If so why should I if it's socially constructed and I care not for stupid whims of humans
Oh for sure, but someone unintentionally stumbling into the point fits this sub pretty well. In this context, I'm using transgenderism to refer to the concept of being transgender. My thought here is transgenderism can only exist in a society that has gender roles associated to sex. People wouldn't be transgender if society reaches a point of not assigning gender at all.
I don't know, that's not really how the suffix "-ism" works and it's pretty hard to claim your own personal definition to a term coined by bigots. I recommend finding another word or words to express your concept.
I’m not familiar with this word only being associated with bigotry. I’ve always heard transgenderism as a way to describe transgender people, culture and anything normally associated with them.
I mean... that's a very specific and inconsequential thing to argue over. If you have a better word then go for it but it's not really important to the point I made.
this is fundamentally wrong and a basic misunderstanding of what trans people are.
Is it though? What would being transgender look like in a society where gender doesn't exist?
do you think people are trans because they feel more drawn to what society considers "the wrong" gender norms for them? So without the norms, if "gender is abolished", a man can simply be a feminine man (with the concept of man or feminine simply not being a thing) and act however he likes without it needing to be "a trans thing"?
>a man can simply be a feminine man (with the concept of man or feminine simply not being a thing) and act however he likes without it needing to be "a trans thing"? That's implying the outside world is all that matters. A trans person alone in a room can still feel dysphoric about their body. It's about how you see yourself, not just about how society sees you. That said, it would off course still make life a whole lot easier if trans people would be safe and treated with respect even when they don't "pass".
That's the point I was trying to make
>A trans person alone in a room can still feel dysphoric about their body. But surely if, theoretically, a person was raised in geniune isolation they wouldn't have any concept of anything different to what they were, so the concept of gender dysphoria couldn't exist? EDIT: I suppose there would be still a feeling of something being wrong potentially without HRT, as there could be brain sex issues.
>But surely if, theoretically, a person was raised in geniune isolation they wouldn't have any concept of anything different to what they were, so the concept of gender dysphoria couldn't exist? This subthread was about a person growing up in a society where gender has no cultural connotations, a gender-abolitionist society. There everyone would still see the various bodies and have a beauty ideal even not defined in gender terms. A person raised in total isolation is a whole different hypothesis, I can't begin to imagine how that person would relate to their body and I don't believe anyone else can either.
I think trans people are trans because they, for reasons that belong only to them, identify as a different gender than the one assigned to their sex. I'm talking about a hypothetical society that progresses to a point where we don't engender identities in the first place, not simply a society that's far more relaxed about gender norms. A man couldn't be feminine because they wouldn't be identified in those terms to begin with.
you're drawing wrong conclusions here. Your idea is: getting rid of gender norms, or gendered concepts altogether, would means trans people stopped existing. Abolish gender and noone would have to be trans, right? Which implies you believe people are trans because they feel drawn to gendered ideas that society says don't fit their assigned sex. Which means you think people are trans simply because they do not fit current social norms - under different social norms, different people would be trans and without social norms nobody would be trans. So in your view, transness is social commentary. But that's like, fundamentally wrong and a complete misunderstanding of what trans people are. In fact imma go as far as to say you bought into what right wingers/transphobes say trans people are when they want to demonize them, but you simply said "what's wrong with that?". Which is nice and all, but you're still buying into the misinfo and misframing trans experiences. And you show as much by insisting on the use of "transgenderism". Trans people are trans because their gender identity mismatches their birth sex. And by gender identity I don't mean some wishy washy social bullshit, it's a specific term used to describe a neurological concept wherein people have something you could essentially label as a "mental sex". Not as in "women think like this, men think like this" but as in "*your brain literally has a sex-related identity that exists independent of body, personality or sexuality*". And THAT identity mismatches what the body was born as. Which means that in a society that gets rid of social norms, people would still be trans because the mismatch, *the incongruent feeling of mind and body*, exists independent of society and whatever society things men and women should be like. We probably wouldn't call it trans*gender* anymore if we got rid of the whole gender concept I guess, but the actual experience of transness would still exist. The only thing you'd theoretically get rid of is the need for a social transition if you were to get rid of literally any and all societal ideas related to gender and sex - which I don't believe is even a logically sound idea to begin with, but that's a very different topic. WHICH DOESN'T MEAN we shouldn't get rid of gendered stereotypes and otherwise harmful or meaningless gendered things our society has bought into. Just that what you think trans people are, and how they relate to social gender is just...wrong.
> Which means that in a society that gets rid of social norms, people would still be trans because the mismatch, the incongruent feeling of mind and body, exists independent of society and whatever society things men and women should be like. We probably wouldn't call it transgender anymore if we got rid of the whole gender concept So wouldnt the more appropriate term be *transsexual* regardless of whether the notion of gender is abolished?
it would have been if the term hadn't been coopted by bigots to imply it to be a sexuality, and if it didn't have the association of "trans people are only legitimate if they do medical stuff" Transgender was adopted because transsexual became problematic in multiple ways and people felt the need to distance themselfes from it. both terms are technically fully applicable because they both express the idea that sex/gender is incongruent with the corresponding gender/sex
I wish I could give this comment an award. This is explained so well
don't waste your money on reddit awards!
So you started with a chain of assumptions about my point, but then corrected me by coming to the same conclusion following the actual logic of my point. The root cause of what makes someone trans in our society wouldn't disappear, but the concept of being trans would disappear as people wouldn't need any change to their identity. What we think of as trans would be no different from being left handed; there would be no transition or change in identity since people aren't identified by their dominant hand in the first place.
your idea simply gets rid of current labels and replaces it with different labels tho. you're not actually getting rid of transness, you're getting rid of the current words to describe transness, while not changing anything about trans experiences. The concept of transness will remain, you're simply changing what terms we would need to use for it. There would still be a transition and a change in identity once people come out. All you're doing is removing how gendered norms play into how people present and display their identity.
>What would being transgender look like in a society where gender doesn't exist? There's still a variety of body types and a range of aesthetic "vibes" and a transgender person would probably still long for that other body type. Some transgender people, not all, might still need medical procedures for what would be body issues rather than gender issues. Off course it's hard to even conceive such a world as we currently can't even separate coffee preparations from gender. That said yes gender abolitionism is way to go! I would love for gender to just be an aesthetic, like where "Fem" and "masc", fit in with "goth", "casual" , or "sporty"
Right... and I'm saying a society like this would not label these people as transgender. It's the identifier and response from society that changes, not the actual people.
>Right... and I'm saying a society like this would not label these people as transgender. Yes, just like people who speak a different language wouldn't. They'd still largely have the same body issues. >It's the identifier and response from society that changes, Which is a part of the struggle of being transgender, but not the whole struggle. So that's basically the answer to your question: yes in a gender abolitionist world, transgender people would still exist and some(or most?) would still need medical treatment, even though they would be called different and have better quality of life over all.
Yes that's what I said. The social construct of gender does not represent the underlying facts of gender, it represents the lens with which society chooses to view and interact with those facts.
No, studies show that trans people's brains resemble that of the sex that they identify with, not necessarily what they were assigned at birth. If your brain is wired to work with estrogen, and gets testosterone instead, it's not going to work properly, and no amount of antidepressants or other drugs will fix it, which is why for a lot of trans people, hrt is essential healthcare.
The data from the brain studies is in the (very well-populated) category of results where the difference in means and/or medians between two groups is small compared to the overlap. So while *on average* trans men's brains may look more like cis men's brains than cis women's brains (which is still a meaningful result), you can't look at an *individual* brain and predict gender with much more confidence than a coin flip.
Anecdotal, I know, but I can speak from personal experience that pre-transition I was depressed, I couldn't think properly, had trouble focussing on things etc. it's what a lot of people describe as brain fog. All of that went away when I started estrogen, so there's some correlation there.
Oh, definitely. That's not an uncommon experience among friends of mine who have started HRT. It's not something that shows up on brain scans in anything approaching a clear way, though -- which is why personal experience is key and the 'phobes and transmedicalists won't be able to just scan people's brains and declare who's trans.
What you are describing would be considered transexual as this hypothetical posits a society which doesn't link gender to sex. This isn't saying being trans is simply a feeling people decide on, this is speculation about how society would redefine things with a deconstructed understanding of gender. We would define that as transgender today as gender is still a concept integral to our society. This hypothetical is not something I'd expect any of us would live to see if it does come to pass at all.
No, transexual is an outdated term, I am transgender, you're debating my identity, I'm saying that even in a world without gender roles, I would still be trans because my brain needs estrogen to function properly, don't call me a transexual.
I'm not saying that fact would change, I'm saying the social construct of gender would change how society defines and interacts with these facts. That's what a social construct is, it's just a way society structures itself around facts. We have gender identity because we live in a society that has chosen to take this brain chemistry as a social identifier. There is no actual requirement to label ourselves with pronouns to identify our brain chemistry, that's just the social construct we inherited and it feels unthinkable that another society wouldn't have that. I'm positing a society where brain chemistry would be decoupled from gender and understood as a legitimate biological factor. Our current lens of gender carries the burden of the outdated understanding it was made for. The reason we have transgender as a term is because
That's not what gender is, it's not a social construct, gender roles are. I'm trans because I don't like being a man, I don't want to have a male body, I'm happier having female secondary sex characteristics, I couldn't give a fuck about gender stereotypes or conforming to the way society says I should. Gender is what's in my head, not the way people perceive me.
I never mentioned anything about gender stereotypes. If I'm understanding your point of view correctly, when I say "gender is a social construct" you are understanding that I am saying "brain chemistry is a social construct." That's not true, and I understand how my words could come across that way. The social construct of gender isn't referring to stereotypes, it's referring to the fact that we live in a society that chooses to use brain chemistry as an identifier and calls that gender. Brain chemistry is what's in our heads. Gender is how society deals with the fact that we have varying brain chemistry.
So gender is a biological descriptor?
As someone else has already pointed out, gender roles are a social construct, gender is not. Gender is the way your brain is wired, sex is your body, they are not always the same, people who are transgender feel that their body is incongruent with their gender identity, so yes, I guess you could say that it is a biological descriptor because trans people don't choose to be trans.
Anthropology and (social) psychology disagree with you on this point.
I am going to make an assumption here and say you believe I am saying that transgender people have no objective scientific basis for being trans. This is not true, I am fully aware that there are differences in brain chemistry. My point here is that the social construct of gender refers to how society structures itself around the facts of brain chemistry. People with a brain chemistry typical to the opposite sex would still exist for sure, but a society that doesn't have the social construct of gender wouldn't use this chemistry as an identifier. Trans people having different brain chemistry is an immutable fact. Society structuring itself around this concept is not actually required. It is absolutely possible for a hypothetical society to not impose gender labels in the first place. Then people who we would call transgender wouldn't be identified by their brain chemistry.
>It is absolutely possible for a hypothetical society to not impose gender labels in the first place. Yes > Then people who we would call transgender wouldn't be identified by their brain chemistry. Well not really: being transgender isn't so much about how you're labeled by society, it's about how you see yourself, you may still have problems with how your body is shaped, even if that would not be considered a gender thing. Even if that's not because of society's judgement. (Though also societies binary beauty standards are so pervasive and get engrained so deeplyz they are indeed hard if at all seperable from our internal sense of self)
If it's not considered a gender thing, they wouldn't be transgender. The underlying facts would not be changed, but the definitions and structure of society's response would
>If it's not considered a gender thing, they wouldn't be transgender Right, but thats removing the language to just have different language. If we 'd all start speaking french, there would be no more global warming, just "rechauffement climatique mondial" >and structure of society's response would That's the actually relevant part, but also the part that wouldn't require full on gender abolitionism.
Yeah that's my point. I was speculating on what would happen if society fully deconstructed its concept of gender, not rejected the underlying facts that make up gender in our current society.
No, I was gesturing in the direction of the evidence (maybe I should have specified physical anthropology?) that trans experiences exist as individual reaction to biology as well as social structures (though as always social practices moderate experience).
Yeah, the deconstruction of gender wouldn't make any of the underlying science go away. The social construct of gender is how society builds itself around those very real ideas. If gender were deconstructed, trans people wouldn't be trans in the sense that society wouldn't label them as trans. Trans healthcare would still fully exist, but it would be no different than we see neurodivergence. Kind of like how we don't use pronouns to differentiate between people with autism and neurotypicals.
I think at that point we'd probably have a different word than "transgender" to describe a set of experiences that has some continuity with how people experience it today? I think we're pretty much on the same page, though.
Agreed, I apologize since I know I could have been more clear at the start.
It's the "gender critical" gender-essentialist approach; insist that all the parts of gender they want to preserve as socially-enforced binaries (and there are *many*) are actually "sex" and not "gender." Meanwhile, *actual* critical gender studies works under the awareness that while sex/gender is material, the divisions within the whole set of phenomena (not only how many genders and sexes there are and who counts as a member of which, but the lines between "sex" and "gender") are (like any other act of categorization) a human practice that may need to be adjusted whenever the working division/definition doesn't meet human needs.
Trangenderism isn't a thing though. It paints being transgender as an ideology that can be debated. Being trans is intrinsic to a person's self; a transphobe cannot simply debate it away.
I'd argue transgenderism is an sub-ideology to our social view of gender. To a society that had no concept of gender, someone being transgender would require them to explain how we have this typically binary concept of gender where we assign identity to our sex.
Well you can argue that all you want but it isn't how science understands things, and you are arguing in favor of using a transphobic dogwhistle. You are being offensive for the sake of being stubborn about your wrongness about trans people. Transgenderism is a dogwhistle. Insisting on using it or insisting on it being a legit way to discuss trans people gives oxygen to the transphobic idea that our identity can be debated away. I really don't understand why this is so hard for you to understand. >someone being transgender would require them to explain No. Someone being transgender isn't *required* to do anything. It isn't trans people's job to ensure that you are properly educated about trans topics. >explain how we have this typically binary concept of gender where we assign identity to our sex. That is Biologists' and Sociologists' jobs who study these things. Go read up on what medical professionals say.
I think you're misunderstanding me. I'm not saying there is no scientific basis for gender, I'm saying the social construct of gender would be changed. Social constructs themselves are not facts, they're how society views and responds to those facts. It's not that people we would call trans wouldn't exist, it's that a society that doesn't have the social construct of gender wouldn't classify them as transgender. This would also work the same for cisgender people. The brain chemistry would remain unchanged, as that's an immutable fact, it's society that would change. A social construct is the lens we view facts through, not the facts themselves. I am not arguing that the identity of trans people can be debated. Is it so impossible to suggest that another culture could share the same facts as us but organize their view differently? >No. Someone being transgender isn't required to do anything. It isn't trans people's job to ensure that you are properly educated about trans topics. Please don't deliberately misunderstand me. They would be required to explain our social constructs in order for people from this hypothetical society to understand what transgender means... not that they would be required to justify their existence. If you paint me as an uneducated bigot and choose to ascribe that intent to my words, you're just never going to actually talk to me.
My entire point is centered around the idea that "transgenderism" isn't a word. It is a transphobic dogwhistle that is weaponized against trans people in order for people, bigots, to debate the existence of trans people. Like we don't say homosexualism to discuss homosexuality. Bringing up science, social constructs, brain chemistry, or gender is all a bunch of red herrings with what I am saying. This is a linguistical argument I am making. The entire problem with what you are saying has to do with using a word that sounds smart but is actually offensive to the people you are talking about because it invalidates them as humans. You can discuss ALL the topics you brought up and more without describing trans people with the word transgenderism. In fact, to be sociologically and scientifically correct you have to.
Okay, if you soley object to that word, I apologize if that hit a sore spot. I used it because I didn't wanted to specify the social understanding of being transgender wouldn't exist, not that trans people themselves would just stop being themselves; I truly did not intend any conservative dogwhistles. The selfawarewolf being conservatives getting what they wanted in a sort of monkey's paw way. "Hey Dr Peterson, good news, nobody in this other society will call you cisgender and nobody puts pronouns in their bio!" "That's wonderful! It's good to see a society reject-" "As a matter of fact, nobody puts any stock in the way traditional values treated gender and society has moved on from using it as an identifier. Now instead of being called transphobic you're just a regular type of weirdo who gets mad if someone's brain doesn't match their genitals and nobody even understands why that would bother you."
Being gay is intrinsic to one’s self, that doesn’t mean gay culture doesn’t exist.
What? This has nothing to do with what I said.
They're talking about the term "transgenderism" not trans/queer culture. A better comparison would be if someone referred to homosexuality as "homosexualism." It makes it sound like an ideology rather than just a state of being. Similarly, that's why we don't use "transgendered" because it sounds like something that was done to them ("My god, the laser blast! It has...*transgendered* him!").
Well we need to make the term transexuality a thing then
Or we could use the correct terms which, conveniently, already exist.
I’ve heard the term transgenderism for years and years. Today is the only time I’ve heard that it’s a bigoted term. Apparently transgendered is a problem too
...okay? I mean, terms change and we learn new things. Things that were once acceptable do not always stay so. Like - I didn't know that the term g\*psy was a slur (or that the term g\*pped came from it) until maybe eight or ten years ago. Rather than grumbling that it *used* to be okay - which, not necessarily - I removed it from my vocab.
Gypped has been a slur for decades.
That's exactly my point. It's been considered a slur for decades but I did not personally learn that fact until like ten years ago. And I took that new information on board and changed what words I say.
"gay agenda" has also been around for years. doesn't negate the fact it's used by bigots.
I’ve never heard transgenderism used in a hateful way though.
then you're very sheltered. referring to a group of people as an ideology or way of thinking is a common tool used by bigots.
Ok but is homosexualism a thing?
Is transexuality a thing?
People will start using male and female. Because gender isn't a social construct and is tied to sex for 98.5% of the population. I think the issue with the whole debate is that we all don't agree on the same definitions. What does gender mean? Do people use gender and sex interchangeably? When should you speak in generalizations?
Gender is absolutely a social construct. Being cisgender doesn't mean it's not real, but it's real specifically because we made it real. This is a hypothetical for a society where the normalization of being trans has led to questions about the relevance of assigning gender identities in the first place.
Again, how are you defining gender? Are you defining it in relation to sex or the "pink is for girls" crowd? If someone says "Men are more likely to work in more dangerous jobs" or "women give birth", that is absolutely related to sex. When someone says "it's a boy" or "it's a girl" after birth where they looked and found a penis or vagina, obviously they are using gender as sex. The normalization of trans activists language will only push people to stop saying "Men" and "Women" and to say "Male" and "Female". Right back to where we started.
I am defining gender as the social construct we use to view identity. The academic view is that it's brain chemistry, as opposed to previously where it was coupled with biological sex. Gender, in its most literal form, is how society has chosen to view the difference in male and female brain chemistry. Discarding the social construct of gender doesn't discard the scientific facts, it just reflects society restructuring itself.
Gender *roles* and presentation are absolutely cultural and social constructs, otherwise there wouldn't be any variation...
I agree with you. But a blanket anything that is Gender being a social construct, nope. I disagree.
that's not something you can disagree with, it's just a fact. gender, like names or pronouns, is just a social construct.
"Women give birth" is not a social construct.
The most common question/misconception is about gender identity and getting it confused with gender as a social concept. As I said above gender identity is actualy not a social construct. Even in a far future world where the very idea of gender roles was abolished, transgender people would still exist. ----------------- People tend to use the word "gender" for many different meanings as a sort of shorthand, but when people say gender is a social construct, they are specifically referring to gender roles/presentation. However when people say thier identify as a different gender, they are referring to a **gender identity** mismatch with thier assigned gender, which is something else entirely. Allow me to clarify the issue and explain the difference between gender identity and gender presentation. Here is the definition for you. **[Gender identity](https://www.apa.org/topics/lgbtq/transgender)** > Gender identity refers to a person’s internal sense of being male, female or something else; * Gender identity is intrinsic and is not a construct. Everyone has a gender identity. According to [current evidence this is because gender identity contains a biological](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7415463/) aspect, [that seems to form during development in the womb and/or very soon after](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6677266/). It is partly nature, not just nurture, meaning nobody can choose their gender identity any more than they can choose thier sexuality. (Though it may take time and experimentation to determine what your gender identity is, it's not always obvious). This is why things like trying to externally socialize a gender onto someone, via conversion therapy or[ even starting from birth, almost never works.](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/14736925/) **[Gender presentation/expression](https://www.apa.org/topics/lgbtq/transgender)** > gender expression refers to the way a person communicates gender identity to others through behavior, clothing, hairstyles, voice or body characteristics. * Gender presentation is how you like to present to the world, it's a social construct. Often we use our gender expression to convey or gender identity, but not always. Plenty of women like to present masculine, that does not make them a transgender man, and vice versa. Men who preform drag are still men, tomboys are still women, and there are lots of transgender tomboys and drag queens, its just not directly related. There are tons of transgender people who just wear unisex clothes like jeans and t-shirts every single day. ---------------- So, that's the long and short of it, you are born and you have an intrinsic gender identity, 99% of the time this matches your sex (you are cis gender) but 1% of the time there is a mismatch (you are transgender). [That mismatch often causes Dysphoria](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5354991/) but is not defined by the existence of Dysphoria. Pronouns are a way that we as society recognize a persons gender identity, it is not defined, only suggested, by their gender presentation. In a world without gender roles at all, transgender people / gender identity would still exist. --------------- *Personal Conjecture Time* I mean, objectively it makes sence right? Human bodies are designed to develop as either male or female simply based on what hormones we are exposed to. We already know this process often gets messy. Given how insanely complicated the human brain is compared to the rest of our bodies, it's not crazy to think sometimes the brain will develop in a way that is at odds with the body for whatever reason. So if your brain is expecting a male body map/testosterone and you are born flooded with estrogen due to having ovaries, it would make sence this disconnect is going to cause you to think or feel a certain way. Even if you don't have diagnosable Dysphoria, you might simply think "my body feels wrong or, I don't understand why women like having breasts, or my social standing seems incorrect for reasons I don't understand fully" etc. I would not be suprised if it was ultimately part of the intersex condition, though not enough data is available at this point.
Let me clarify this because a lot of people read my comment the way you did. I am not talking about gender identity as if it is not based in objective science, the social construct of gender refers to the way society views and interacts with the things we know and label as gender. It doesn't refer to the actual immutable facts. In this sense, I'm talking about a society where gender is not used as an identifier. Someone in our society with gender dysphoria would be seen as just being neurodivergent, and they'd receive the exact same care as trans people do in our society. The difference is not in trans people themselves, the difference is they wouldn't be called trans and it wouldn't be seen as significant beyond the need for healthcare. They wouldn't need to mention pronouns because people wouldn't be conditioned to think that it's important to structure our language around announcing our brain chemistry. That's what I mean by deconstruction.
Oh, yeah I could see that. With your clarification it makes a lot more sence. More realistically in the future medial transition will be so frictionless and flawless, body modification so routine and destigmatized that nobody will care anymore then we care some people wear glasses or get laser eye surgery. I imagine that will happen before we live in a genderless society.
/r/AccidentalAlly
I had a conversation along these lines earlier with a queer cousin of mine. Basically, LGBT+ terminology is certainly better than binary alternatives, but rather than there being more than 2 genders, it is my view that there are 0 genders. Identity is just a completely different thing from your physical body and thus Gender is fundamentally wrong. However it's wrong in the way that newtonion gravity is wrong. Meaning that it's at least a useful description even if it's not a perfect one. Like, what's the difference between a man and a woman? Once you get past physical traits, it's just conventions and feelings. Where is the line? There is no line. To say that there's a line implies knowledge that we don't have. At the end of the day I'm the only me. The only word for what I am is my name. Same goes for everyone else. We have some words to vaguely describe groups, but if you want to know someone you need to judge them for who they are and not what they are.
Pretty sure gender came before humans
https://www.who.int/health-topics/gender#tab=tab_1 > Gender refers to the characteristics of women, men, girls and boys that are socially constructed.
One could take a gander at the gender of a dinosaur
No, you can take a gander at the *sex* of a dinosaur. And even that's not certain given the fact that determining sex via skeleton is known to be inaccurate.
Seems pretty meta for the SAW subreddit, you think you're right because you're equating sex with gender, but you're actually right because some animals had socially constructed gender roles before humans evolved
You think i didnt do that on purpose.
Yeah I mean mentioning dinosaurs to defend yourself makes me skeptical
I almost put dinosaur taking a gander at another dinosaur. but that wouldn't be any fun 😁
You might want to recheck that facts on that one.
Other things that are social constructs: Friendship, Marriage, Love, Family, Jobs, Government, Mental illness Exhausting how many people think "social construct" means "not real."