Amazingly Martin many things “repeated in the most elementary biology texts” are contradicted in more advanced texts and coursework. My take on it (which happens to be the same take that the American Psychology Association takes) is that “biological sex” is based on a variety of factors: “including sex chromosomes, gonads, internal reproductive organs, and external genitalia.” It does refer to physical findings, not cultural/psychological/societal attributes. It is not binary; intersex exists as a biological state and medically was commonly used to refer to the biological sexual status of someone whose various biological sexual features, including choromosomes, are atypical and discordant. The current consensus statement now prefers the term “disorder of sexual development” and rather than calling an individual “male” or “female” uses more specific terms, such as “ovotesticular DSD” and “46, XX testicular DSD.”
Note in that statement the effort made to distinguish between gender identity, gender role, and sexual orientation. Broomstick provides an example of someone who was uncomfortable with female gender roles but had concordant gender identity to her biological sex. Her answer to my question may be the best that is possible: it boils down to being comfortable within one’s own skin.
Agreed that from a technical perspective an individual whose structural and chromosomal characteristics are a both certain sex is that biological sex no matter what their gender identity, but confusion over the terms gender and sex are so endemic that lack of precise language hardly is enough to label one delusional. Even the consensus statement cited falls back into using the word “sex” in the context of “sex of rearing” when “gender” would posibly have been the more precise term. Are they delusional for having written that?
An individual with GID has a gender identity as male or female discordant with external biological sex. To say that they believe they are the wrong sex would not be inaccurate (referring to the external features part of the definition) and to say that sex is exclusively a matter of having a Y chromosome is inaccurate. That endocrinology consensus statement and the APA statement would both take some issue with your claim that biological sex is determined at fertilization period. Some aspects of biological sex are changeable, not the chromosomal aspect, but that is not the sole defining aspect of biological sex. Gender identity seems less malleable.
Definitions are fuzzy in this area and I agree that it is important to make sure that other readers know what you mean when you use a term that others may understand differently than you do, and conversely to be sure that you understand what someone means when they use a term. Getting pedantic OTOH is unhelpful, IMHO.
I find it shocking a doctor would expect me to view a psychologist organization as having any validity in defining biological sex. This issue is not at all controversial among wildlife biologists and psychology is heavily mixed with social sciences in any case and can be safely dismissed if you want to talk to me of defining biological sex.
You are certainly correct that advanced texts will expand upon elementary principles, but unless biology is the worst taught discipline in all of academia then advanced biology texts would only expand upon or explain “marginal cases”, they wouldn’t totally reverse basic tenets of the introductory texts.
Doctors also are often not really great resources on biology, biology informs medicine but treatment concerns can require a different way of looking at things. A biologist has no reason to revise the settled science that mammalian sex is determined at fertilization, but a doctor might find it more helpful in understanding various conditions to wade into gender and self-identity issues and thus adopt a view that obscures the biological sex of a patient. But I don’t see how that changes the core science.
The XX/XY system of sexual determination is so well established that the desire to try and present it as unsettled science is baffling to me. This would be akin to evolution denying if not for the politics involved in this discussion.
The APA’s opinion on biological sex almost certainly would not be taught to biology undergrad majors and wouldn’t be widely accepted by any biology texts I am familiar with that were written by persons holding Ph.D’s in biology.
I hope you would have enough perspective to concede that individuals involved in treatment of human patients are not nearly appropriately situated to proclaim how mammalian sex is determined–that is the role of the biologist whose view encompasses a far broader study of the science of living things. I don’t even trust MDs or Psychologists to even rigorously talk about biological versus “vaguer” definitions of sex, and I imagine most members of the APA if questioned on the chromosome issue as it relates to mammals in general would probably say that the consensus view is more about gender identity than it is strictly about a traditional biological sex determination.
Again, you are conflating chromosomal or genetic sex with biological sex, when it is just one component of biological sex. And sure, an embryo can be defined as male or female by it’s chromosomes, because at that point that is the only defining criteria available, but once it starts to develop (or not) secondary sex characteristics it is defined by those as well.
Biological Sex is defined by both primary and secondary sex characteristics.
You can keep repeating whatever you want to your hearts content, it doesn’t make it true. As a member of the medical community and clinical researcher with more than a freshman level university education in human biology I’m pretty secure in my understanding of the basic definition of biological sex. A phenotype is a biological characteristic. Do you seriously not think intersex is a scientific term? Or do you really believe it is just made up by proponents of woo?
You seem pretty stuck on the ‘determination’ aspect of biological sex (again, consider the meaning of the word within the context of biology and genetics, because this is where I believe you are seriously confused. Determination typically means ‘determining a pathway of differentiation’) - when the differentiation aspect is just as critical in defining biological sex. If they are discordant, then the person is defined as intersex or indeterminate. If a person is is genetically XY, but does not present with anatomical/physiological male characteristics then they are intersex. You can stamp your feet until you are blue in the face, but being genetically or chromosomally male without differentiating phenotypically male does not a ‘biological male’ make. Sorry.
We are discussing humans and my citations included the International Consensus Conference on Intersex organized by the Lawson Wilkins Pediatric Endocrine Society and the European Society for Paediatric Endocrinology and was endorsed by the American Academy of Pediatrics. If you want to take the position that those bodies are not compentant to define words as they should be used in medical contexts and that the only defintion is the simplistic one that you want to use, then go ahead.
In point of fact however you are wrong even in your assertion of how biologists use the term. Wildlife biologists do *not *define “sex” according to chromosomal status determined at fertilization. See for example this article discussing the social control control of sex change in the Bluehead Wrasse, and this one discussing how sex change is common among a variety of species and seems to be related to body size.
Note they are not claiming that the individuals change their chromosomal status.
Chromosomes are one of several determinants for biological sex from the biologists perspective and not the defining feature. Biological sex is instead a phenotypic state which can be determined by temeprature, size and social status in different species. In mammals chromosome status is usually what results in the phenotypic state that is biological sex but is not the definition of it. Not by the medical community and not by biologists.
I think you are seriously misunderstanding ‘determination’ within the context of human biology and genetics and are only further embarrassing yourself by spewing nonsense about DSeid’s or medical science’s knowledge on the subject.
So, you can stick with your interpretation of ‘wild life biology of mammals’ and the rest of us will stick with our medical knowledge of human biology since the thread is actually within that scope afterall.
PS
I also was a TA in Human anatomy. Guess I was just a misinformed grad student who lacked a basic biological understanding of mammals, eh? :rolleyes:
Her exact words to me were: “You are the embodiment of the Dunning–Kruger effect”, which Wikipedia defines as “a cognitive bias in which unskilled individuals suffer from illusory superiority”. If you are insisting that “suffering from illusory superiority” would not qualify as a “delusion”, I would simply respond that it is a distinction without a difference.
Thank you!
Yes! Perfectly explained, thank you as well.
These questions are all on point. Nicely stated (or posed).
A related question though is: “who decides”? Una has said she does believe in gatekeeping. So who is the gatekeeper? If it is decided by a majority of the group so named, then I’m not sure trans people will get the ruling they want (I’m not sure they wouldn’t, either: I suspect a poll of people who self-identify as female would be interesting and might be close to a 50/50 split). There are obviously older and more conservative women who would vote “nay” on M to F transgendered people; but from recent research it appears there are a decent number of feminists and lesbians who are also hostile to these people as perceived interlopers.
Are *you *trying to be funny now? Because to me those are mutually exclusive propositions. But I’m not that interested in an endless semantic dispute, and we’ve been warned to cool our jets anyway, so I’ll leave it at that.
I assume you don’t have a problem with unisex bathrooms of the type where it is a small room with one toilet and one sink and you can lock the door? Maybe we need to move toward having more of these instead of big group bathrooms.
For me that’s pretty much that.
My family is full of tomboys and girls having been mistaken for boys in childhood. I had no lack of role models that you can be a masculine woman. And I am only attracted to men.
But my main beef wasn’t with gender roles, but the way my body looked and felt when I hit puberty.
I spend the bulk of my time alone in front of my computer, or alone in the forest, or alone taking care of goats and sheeps. But I am happier than ever to be able to do all that with a flat chest and hairs all over me, and see and rub my five o clock shadow. Or singing alone in the car, but with a deep voice. And sexually, it feels awesome to rub my flat hairy chest against another flat hairy chest. (It is a bit TMI, or may seems silly, but it is that detail that crystallized for me that I had made the right choice. Things just felt right to interact sensually and sexually with a male looking body).
Plus, it’s not like I’m an uber masculine guy anyway, I’ve always scored neutral on the bem sex-role inventory for ex.
SlackerInc do you understand that there’s a difference between being wrong, and being delusional? In your last post, you twice complained about being called delusional when, in fact, people were just pointing out that you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.
No, it’s nothing like a delusion. She said you’re mistaken and overestimating how well informed you are. This is certainly turning into a pattern, though.
What is shocking is the arrogant ignorance of this entire post. It is obvious you are only willing to adopt definitions of biological sex that conform with your own bias or prejudice and label it the only ‘settled science’ on the matter - despite your own “baffling” ignorance of basic biology, particularly the concept of determination.
The issue of gender identity is more unsettled, the definition of biological sex is NOT.
Ironically, the quote I cited upthread on Chromosomal Sex Determination in Mammals was an excerpt from a text titled Developmental Biology - just the sort of text used in undergraduate biology, authored by a Biology PhD. Not some ‘random article on the internet’ you dismissed by declaring texts used by biology undergrads, authored by PhD’s, the ultimate authority on the matter. (you are also totally wrong about SYR gene on the Y chromosome, which is beside the point, other than to reiterate your ignorance on sex chromosomes and gene expression/interaction in primary sex determination.)
To further help you out, I have excerpts from another text used in wide distribution in undergraduate biology, authored by another Biology PhD, as it is the authority you hold so dear.
Do you have a cite for this recent research? There was a piece on Slate just the other day about the Michigan Womyn’s Festival, which has always had a policy of excluding transwomen. The author, who has very positive feelings about the festival, says that the no transwomen policy is so offputting to younger lesbians that they tend to not only boycott the festival but pressure their favorite musicians not to perform at it either. While the author is in favor of the policy, she makes a point of saying that she doesn’t consider herself transphobic and supports trans rights.
I’m not familiar with any other feminist- or lesbian-centric gathering that has a policy of excluding transwomen, and it sounds like the Michigan Womyn’s Festival’s policy has hurt attendance in recent years. According to the Slate piece, attendance this year was around 3,000 women while the biggest year – which was nearly 30 years ago – attracted 10,000 women.
37 signators on a letter that rejects trans-females is not quite what I would call “a decent number.” About 3 dozen self-described radical femnists have a POV. Gosh. Go up several orders of magnitude and you might get up decent numbers. Poll a few thousands and demonstrate say over 10 to 15% and it might count. A few dozen? Nah. That’s an inconsequential number.
Sorry. EverwonderWhy, somehow I doubt Martin will have the nads of your choice to man or woman up to admitting he was wrong.
Sure, dismiss them. I was unaware they even existed, as I said. But they have apparently been trying to hold gatherings and taking a lot of flack and so on, so making enough waves to cause a bit of a kerfuffle (it’s not like the radical feminist community is so huge to begin with). There are commenters on the site where that was posted that are celebrating, and it was reblogged in several other places; I suppose it’s theoretically possible that those specific signatories, commenters, and bloggers are actually the only feminists on earth that agree with the letter but somehow I doubt it.
No, they’re not alone, obviously, but note the nature of their complaint is that their particular views are no longer welcome in a lot of feminist circles, where they used to be a significant (if not dominant) force. This isn’t a new movement, it’s the defeated remnants of a discredited philosophy, raging against their own irrelevancy.
You’ve either taken what I said out of context or else don’t understand. I’ll assume it’s the latter. In context, a “gatekeeper” is a licensed medical mental health professional who either assesses and diagnoses transsexuality, is a physician who treats transsexuals, or both.
I say I approve wholeheartedly of gatekeepers because I have met quite a few trans fakes, internet-diagnosed kids taking third-world hormone ordered with their parent’s credit cards, or crossdressers trying to find acceptance under the “transgender” term. They hang out at the fringes of the community trying often times to “bag” a t-girl. There is a certain group of men, and some women, who are…I guess the word is “intrigued” about sex with a pre-op t-girl. I’ve met a lot of them. They typically present as a gender which matches their sex, but sometimes not, so they can try to get closer to us.
In addition to this, many transpeople have coincident mental issues due to a life of oppression and discrimination and violence committed on them, normally depression is the coincident issue, which almost always needs some counseling and treatment.
Let me state something else for the record - IMO crossdressers do not belong in the ladies’ room. I don’t want them in there, although I’m not threatened by them. Crossdressers are MEN who identify as MEN and who dress for fun, for show, for entertainment, or as a sexual kink (although almost all of them will follow the Virginia Prince technique of never admitting such in public…). The point it, they should not be using the ladies’ room unless they internally gender-identify as female, all the time, not just for a 2-hour night at a bar.
[QUOTE=SlackerInc]
But they have apparently been trying to hold gatherings and taking a lot of flack and so on, so making enough waves to cause a bit of a kerfuffle (it’s not like the radical feminist community is so huge to begin with). There are commenters on the site where that was posted that are celebrating, and it was reblogged in several other places; I suppose it’s theoretically possible that those specific signatories, commenters, and bloggers are actually the only feminists on earth that agree with the letter but somehow I doubt it.
[/QUOTE]
The same can be said of any fringe group in existence. Urban legends are reblogged in many places. Show some hard stats on this groundswell of feminist backlash you posit exists.
Slacker, don’t get me wrong. I have no doubt that there are femnists and lesbians who believe that a trans-woman is a male, who are hostile, and/or who see trans issues being lumped in with LGB issues as a threat to the emerging mainstream acceptance of LGB even in conservative circles. Gays can be prejudiced and/or conservative and/or ignorant just like anyone else. Maybe few feminists are conservative but having their share of prejudices, ignorance, and stupidity? I would be shocked if not so. Sharing one characteristic or POV is no assurance that all other opinions are the same.
I have no personal knowledge of how common or uncommon such attitudes are among femnists and/or lesbians. Your cite however provides no evidence that such is common and if anything demonstrates that such POVs are becoming increasingly marginalized in feminist and lesbian activist communities - to the degree that even 37 people being willing to sign a public document expressing a desire to have those who they consider faux-female excluded from their meeting and frustration that they are unable to find venues that will allow them to do that is “news.”
In any case your point was based on a misunderstanding what Una was talking about with the gatekeeper comment and immaterial.
I thought I brought up asshole radfems a few pages ago? Maybe it was a different thread. Anyway, yeah, they are a small and shrinking minority, and mainstream feminists really hate them.
