# If "there's no such thing as race," is there such a thing as gender? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 5, 2012, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779 "2012-03-05T03:43:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/81 "2012-03-06T01:39:02Z")
> [@gracer](#): > > I’m taking the statistic from the BBC documentary _Me, my sex and I_. I think they take it to be broader than chromosomal sex being inconsistent with phenotypic sex. What is being discussed here is \*only \*chromosomal sex being inconsistent with phenotypic sex. The statement that you claimed was wrong because it disagreed with your bogus figures was \*only \*about chromosomal sex being inconsistent with phenotypic sex. As such your contributions are totally irrelevant and I, at least, shall be ignoring them. If you insist on inserting them while we are discussing chromosomal sex being inconsistent with phenotypic sex, I will report you for attempting to hijack the thread. Have a nice day. ---
**Author:** ![gracer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8e7dd6/32.png) [@gracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gracer)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/82 "2012-03-06T01:50:08Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > What is being discussed here is \*only \*chromosomal sex being inconsistent with phenotypic sex. The statement that you claimed was wrong because it disagreed with your bogus figures was \*only \*about chromosomal sex being inconsistent with phenotypic sex. > > As such your contributions are totally irrelevant and I, at least, shall be ignoring them. If you insist on inserting them while we are discussing chromosomal sex being inconsistent with phenotypic sex, I will report you for attempting to hijack the thread. > > Have a nice day. Sheesh, what’s with the rudeness? Sorry if I did something abhorrent in trying to join a discussion the best I can. Why is it a hijack? We’re discussing sex. Doctors use things other than chromosomes and genitals to determine sex, AFAIK. Like I said, this is elaborately explained\* in the documentary I linked to. I really don’t see why you’re reacting so rudely and harshly. \*Just so you understand: I’m not deliberately making things up or anything, or citing the Daily Mail. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/83 "2012-03-06T02:35:09Z")
Its happened to everybody sometime, hasn’t it? Someone asks if you are talking about a man or a woman and you are talking about a chromosomal andromorph with variegated genitalia, and you don’t know what to answer. _Awkward_! ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/84 "2012-03-06T02:41:11Z")
😃 ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/85 "2012-03-06T03:05:21Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > **Rand Rover** , since the point you are trying to make is eluding others as well as myself, perhaps I can help you to clarify by asking a few of simple questions: > > 1. Do you believe it is possible for me to build a machine that could analyse photographs of people’s genitals and assign those photographs to “pictures of vaginas”, “pictures of penises” and “pictures of something else”? If you do not accept this, can you explain what you see as the physical limitations on building such a machine? Yes, of course it is possible to build a machine like you describe. > [@](#): > > 1. If you do believe I can build the machine described above, do you believe that, with a random sample of photographs, the machine would assign \>99% of them as either penises or vaginas? If you do not accept this, can you explain what you see as the physical limitations on building such a machine? Yes, of course I believe that. > [@](#): > > 1. > > ``` > If you accept both the above points, in what sense isn’t this classification scheme perfectly objective? If it can be done by a machine, doesn’t that prove that the classification scheme programmed into the machine is perfectly objective? > > ``` Because, as gracer and I keep pointing out, determining whether a person is a “man” or a “woman” is not just a function of whether they have XX or XY chromosomes, or whether they have testes or ovaries, or whether they make more estrogen or testosterone, or whether they think they are a man or a woman. There’s disagreement and just general confusion and lack of a concrete answer among the scientific community when it comes to what makes a person a man or a woman. If a person presents with XX chromosomes and testes, it takes human judgement to determine if that person is a man or a woman or neither–no objective test that takes into account all of the variables will come up with that answer because no objective test can weigh the factors like a doctor can. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/86 "2012-03-06T03:10:19Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > That person falls into a small intermediate category which in no way invalidates the soundness of calling someone who has a penis, testes and XY chromosomes a man. It’s like you’re arguing that existence of a rare blue rock invalidates the labeling of hugely more commonplace red rocks. At this point, the impression I get is: > > - You believe racial differences do exist and are immutable. > > - You’re trying to prove this by contradiction by claiming that, logically, if racial differences _don’t_ exist, we must accept something seemingly ridiculous - that sexual differences don’t either - because sex and race are similar. > > If there’s another point you were trying to make, I cheerfully admit it eludes me. Red rocks (i.e. “men”) and green rocks (i.e. “women”) divide the landscape pretty clearly, with a small handful of blue rocks scattered randomly about (i.e. “people who through genetic anomaly have some characteristics of both”). The racial equivalent is an wide field of grey rocks, with small quantities of randomly-coloured flecks in them. You know, if you want to discover the point I’m trying to make, then reading my posts is a good way to do that. Making up stuff for me to believe is not. All I’m doing is questioning why the “race is a myth” people are also not all up in arms about gender/sex being a myth. Race and gender/sex are equivalent in the sense that there is no objective test that can determine whether every single person fits into one category or the other–it takes human judgement to fit all people into one category under either heading. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/87 "2012-03-06T03:18:36Z")
Beyond recognizing the existence of people with unusual genetic or physical variations (something I didn’t think was in doubt), I still don’t get the point, and I’m losing confidence I ever will. > [@](#): > > All I’m doing is questioning why the “race is a myth” people are also not all up in arms about gender/sex being a myth. Who is seriously claiming this latter point, and why would we _take_ them seriously? Is this some mythical oh-so-wacky liberal fad, or something? ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/88 "2012-03-06T03:22:21Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > Cite? Thanks. Here’s one example: > **[BBC NEWS | Americas | BBC delves into Brazilians' roots](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/6284806.stm)** > > Nine famous Brazilians undergo DNA tests organised by BBC Brasil to trace their origin - with surprising results for all. [This guy looks black](http://www.google.com/imgres?q=Neguinho+da+Beija-Flor&um=1&hl=en&client=firefox-a&sa=N&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&biw=1064&bih=642&tbm=isch&tbnid=aKI--JEM8yk1fM:&imgrefurl=http://colunistas.ig.com.br/poderonline/2011/05/06/neguinho-da-beija-flor-a-um-passo-do-pcdob/neguinho-da-beija-flor/&docid=k969SDSWdGVvZM&imgurl=http://colunistas.ig.com.br/poderonline/files/2011/05/neguinho-da-beija-flor.jpg&w=333&h=255&ei=G4JVT8StBqPXiQKg8OWFCA&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=409&vpy=149&dur=406&hovh=196&hovw=257&tx=112&ty=105&sig=107822291619812695863&page=1&tbnh=136&tbnw=200&start=0&ndsp=15&ved=1t:429,r:2,s:0), but his DNA is mostly European. > [@](#): > > Neguinho da Beija-Flor’s stage-name indicates his skin colour; in Portuguese, Neguinho means Little Black. > > Montage - Top: Neguinho da Beija Flor, Sandra de Sa, Djavan; Middle: Obina, Milton Nascimento, Ildi Silva; Bottom: Frei David, Seu Jorge, Daiane dos Santos > The BBC project analysed the DNA of nine famous Brazilians > > In this year’s Rio Carnival competition, he sang a song celebrating Brazil’s African roots in a performance that won his samba school the title. > > But having learned to be proud of his African ancestry, he was shocked to find out that about 67% of his genes are European and only 31% African, according to an estimate based on an analysis of his DNA. > > “People will think I’m joking if I tell them this”, said the singer, who knew very little about his African ancestors but nothing at all about his European ones. > > Neguinho da Beija-Flor was among nine celebrities who were tested for a project, called Afro-Brazilian Roots, by the Brazilian Service of the BBC. More to come, if I can track down the peer reviewed studies in a reasonable amount of time. Among people who study this kind of thing, the decoupling of phenotype from genotype in mixed populations is common knowledge. Nothing remarkable about it at all. It’s genetics 101. The genes that code for phenotype are a tiny fraction of the genome. It’s entirely possible to inherit the genes for an African or European phenotype and very little else. Here in the States, the correlation between phenotype and genotype is unusually high as compared with the rest of the New World, because we’ve ferociously policed the caste boundaries to prevent mixing. No other country in the New World has done the same thing. We Americans are the outliers on this issue. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/89 "2012-03-06T03:23:27Z")
Blake, I’m finding it difficult to respond to some of your posts because you keep doing odd things that are hard to respond to, like (i) you keep saying I refuse to do things that I haven’t even not done, much less have refused to do, and (ii) have blatantly misunderstood easy points I made (like the sentence about the temperature of water), indicating that you may be doing so on purpose. In any event, I’ll respond to your earlier post. > [@Blake](#): > > And that is the answer in a nutshell. > > Race is a purely subjective classification scheme. That is why, when we ask the likes of Chen or Rand Rover to name these races that they claim exist, they are utterly unable to do so in any consistent manner. Wrong. I’m not “unable” to do so. As I keep explaining to you, a person doing a study can create any number of races they want to, from one to the number of humans that has ever existed. > [@](#): > > Any racial classification scheme tells us nothing whatsoever about the people within that race beyond the very characteristics used to place them in that race. It is perfectly self referential. You believe this based on a circular argument. You believe that “race is a myth,” so you dismiss out of hand any study that finds a difference among people of different races. You then use your dismissal of those studies to support your point above–that classifying people into races tells us nothing more about them. If you would just calm down and not get all het up about the word “race” and studies that classify people into races, then maybe you would learn something interesting about people of different races. Many Asian folks have eyelids that look different than those of white people and black people etc.–maybe their livers work slightly differently as well in certain contexts, and maybe we can design specific treatments that work on these people’s livers that wouldn’t work on white people’s livers. But you’ll never learn that if you just wave your hands and dismiss any study the results of which are “some asian people have different livers.” > [@](#): > > In short, if aliens came to Earth from another planet tomorrow, the chances of them classifying human populations in any way at all that resembles any existing racial scheme is billions to one against. The boundaries for human “racial” groups are so completely arbitrary that unless someone is told beforehand where those boundaries are, there is no chance they will draw them in the same place. That’s a fairly ridiculous assertion. I think aliens would be able to at least see that black and white and asian people look different than each other, assuming they can perceive differences among humans in the same way that humans can. > [@](#): > > And that also means that the racial groupings are literally meaningless. If you want to describe someone as “Causcasian”, you need to first define “Caucasian”. But once you have placed someone into the Caucasian group you will find that you won;t know a damn thing about them beyond the very characteristics you used to put them in that group. For example, if you define a Causcasian as someone with skin paler than value X with western European ancestry, you will then find that the people in that group have absolutely nothing in common beyond having pale skin and western European ancestry. You are so sure about that only because you dismiss out of hand studies that show those results based on their “fallacious” use of race (i.e., the circular logic you use, as discussed above). > [@](#): > > Now contrast that with sex. Sex is neither arbitrary nor subjective. > > If aliens came to Earth tomorrow, it is a dead certainty that any reproductive classification scheme they applied to humans would include “Male” and “Female” as the two major groups. They may have other categories for individuals who are intersex or immature and so forth, but the two major reproductive groups are unavoidably the group that gestates and the group that fertilises. Again, you simply need more education on this point. You are failing to appreciate gender/sex in all its vagaries and complications. > [@](#): > > Similarly, every human culture in the history of the world has divided humans into two major reproductive classes: male and female. There have been plenty of societies with categories for transvestites or ritual celibates as well, but all societies recognise male and femlae and place the vast majority of people into one of those groups. Plenty of socieities recognize more than one gender/sex. One example is the hijira in India. > [@](#): > > The same also applies to other species. If I take any person to the zoo and and show them a cage full of animals of a type that they have never seen before, they will still divide them into male and female. It doesn’t matter if the person is an Eskimo who has never seen a snake, if she will, after a short period of casual observation or reproduction, infallibly say that there are female snakes, and male snakes. There is nothing arbitrary about sex. It is based on solid, objective difference between individuals. > And once someone has divided humans into male and female, they then know all sorts of things about that species beyond the characteristics used to make the division in the first place. They may divide humans based upon the presence of a penis, for example, but the member sof the group with a penis will also almost all have testes that produce motile sperm. They will almost all have a Y chromosome. They will almost all have high testosterone levels and so on and so forth. There are vast numbers characteristics shared by members of the same sex, and those characteristics are not shared by the vast majority of members of any other sex. > > “Male” isn’t a purely self-referential category that only contains individuals that you are pointing at when you say “male”. That is in stark contrast to a racial group such as “Negro”, where, no matter how you define it, the people in the group called Negro only share the very features that you used to define Negro. They have no other genotypic, phenotypic or behavioural commonality. > > And that is why sexes objectively exist, and why races objectively do not. In a nutshell, it’s because you can’t divide people into races in a manner that works no matter who is doing the dividing, and that tells you something beyond the character that you used to make the division. In contrast, I can teach anyone how to tell the sex of pups in a matter of minutes, and no matter who I teach it to, they will all agree with \>95% accuracy which are dogs and which are bitches. And once the pups are divided into dogs and bitches, I will know that \>95% of the bitches will possess ovaries. I will know that they will ovulate, lack a Y chromosome and so forth. By simply dividing based on the external genitalia, I know all sorts of other things about their genotypes and phenotype. You can’t do anything remotely like this with any racial classification, because race is entirely subjective and self referential. > > Or, as **elucidator** said: Race is superficial, gender is fundamental. I responded to this in my previous reply. Of course a test for gender/sex is objective once you’ve defined “male” to include only “people with XY chromosomes.” But it is subjective if you look at all the variables, and coming up with an objective test like that described above is a subjective exercise in the first place. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/90 "2012-03-06T03:29:10Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Beyond recognizing the existence of people with unusual genetic or physical variations (something I didn’t think was in doubt), I still don’t get the point, and I’m losing confidence I ever will. > > Who is seriously claiming this latter point, and why would we _take_ them seriously? Is this some mythical oh-so-wacky liberal fad, or something? Le sigh. NO ONE is claiming the latter point (i.e., that gender/sex is a myth). That’s the point I’m making. Categorizing people into different races is a subjective exercise. This leads many people to claim that “race is a myth,” “there’s no such thing as race,” “there’s no scientific definition of race,” etc. Categorizing people into different genders/sexes is also a subjective exercise. But no one claims that “gender/sex is a myth” or anything else like that. ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/91 "2012-03-06T03:38:40Z")
[http://www.nature.com/ng/journal/v36/n11s/full/ng1440.html](http://www.nature.com/ng/journal/v36/n11s/full/ng1440.html) > [@](#): > > The results of this study have implications for the use of pigmentation as a ‘marker’ of ancestry in admixed populations. Depending on the degree of population structure present in the admixed population, the correlation between constitutive pigmentation and individual ancestry may be strong, weak or even absent. Parra et al.29 found no correlation between ‘color’ (described as a multivariate evaluation based on skin pigmentation, hair color and texture, and the shape of nose and lips) and African ancestry (based on 10 AIMs) in an admixed sample from Brazil. [http://www.unl.edu/rhames/courses/current/readings/santos-race-brazil.pdf](http://www.unl.edu/rhames/courses/current/readings/santos-race-brazil.pdf) > **[Color and genomic ancestry in Brazilians: a study with forensic...](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17106202/)** > > The population of Brazil, formed by extensive admixture between Amerindians, Europeans and Africans, is one of the most variable in the world. We have recently published a study that used ancestry-informative markers to conclude that in Brazil, at an... > [@](#): > > These results corroborate and validate our previous conclusions using ancestry-informative markers that in Brazil at the individual level there is significant dissociation of color and genomic ancestry. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/92 "2012-03-06T03:41:54Z")
Thanks. I thought you were saying something different than I now see on a re-read. But thanks for digging those up, I will read anyway (but won’t discuss in this thread as they are off-topic). I appreciate it. ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/93 "2012-03-06T03:46:52Z")
> [@](#): > > I think aliens would be able to at least see that black and white and asian people look different than each other, assuming they can perceive differences among humans in the same way that humans can. Pretend you’re an alien. Is [this woman](http://wwwdelivery.superstock.com/WI/223/1760/PreviewComp/SuperStock_1760-5363.jpg) “black”? How about [this guy](http://www.alislam.org.au/sol/graphics/first.jpg)? ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/94 "2012-03-06T03:47:50Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > Because, as gracer and I keep pointing out, determining whether a person is a “man” or a “woman” is not just a function of whether they have XX or XY chromosomes, or whether they have testes or ovaries, or whether they make more estrogen or testosterone, or whether they think they are a man or a woman. I assume you mean “male” and “female”, since the subject of this thread is sex, and not gender. If so, can we have a cite to support your claim that \>95% people with CY chromosomes are not female? Becoz I am calling bullshit. > [@](#): > > There’s disagreement and just general confusion and lack of a concrete answer among the scientific community when it comes to what makes a person a man or a woman. Cite please. Seriously, please provide this evidence that there is confusion in the scientific community as to whether \>95% of people are male or female. I am calling bullshit on this claim. > [@](#): > > If a person presents with XX chromosomes and testes, it takes human judgement to determine if that person is a man or a woman or neither–no objective test that takes into account all of the variables will come up with that answer because no objective test can weigh the factors like a doctor can. So what? This is about the 10th time someone has asked you this. What exactly is your point here? You keep repeating references to the 1 in 5000 that have such conditions as though it’s some sort of a gotcha, but you refuse to actually tell us what the gotcha is. For the love of God, please just stop being coy and tell us what point you think you are making with these ceaseless references to the 0.018% of people whose genitals don’t match there genetic sex. Because so far you have utterly failed to make any point at all. I know you are capable of communicating clearly when you want to, so I have to question why you drag us through 2 pages of obfuscation rather than just telling us what you think a 0.018% deviation allows you to conclude. ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/95 "2012-03-06T03:59:05Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > I don’t know about that last statement, but the previous one also depends on who is doing the looking. If you showed an African a picture of an African American who is 3/4 white, the African is probably going to notice the white aspects of the person’s appearance more than a typical white American would. We are largely conditioned in the West to think of mixed race African/Europeans as being “black”, and so any hint of African ancestry makes the person black. An African is going to have a different starting point, and so isn’t going to come to the same conclusion. Only in the States, really. Not “the West”. The US has some very distinctive ideas about race which don’t really exist anywhere else. Certainly not in Brazil, or Puerto Rico. > **[The “Race” Notion’s Role in Ethnic Assimilation](https://backintyme.wordpress.com/article/the-race-notion-s-role-in-ethnic-k16kl3c2f2au-25/)** > > Most of us realize that only so-called White folks have historically enjoyed the full privileges of U.S. citizenship. And most of us know that the definition of “White” has widened over… ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/96 "2012-03-06T04:01:14Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > Le sigh. NO ONE is claiming the latter point (i.e., that gender/sex is a myth). That’s the point I’m making. You’re questioning why people (well, the “race is a myth” people) aren’t up in arms about an argument no-one is making? > [@](#): > > Categorizing people into different races is a subjective exercise. This leads many people to claim that “race is a myth,” “there’s no such thing as race,” “there’s no scientific definition of race,” etc. > > Categorizing people into different genders/sexes is also a subjective exercise. But no one claims that “gender/sex is a myth” or anything else like that. And the reasons why this is not an example of doublethink have been offered to you repeatedly, in the form of explanations of the genetics of sex and the genetics of race, and how they differ, which as it turns out is quite a bit. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/97 "2012-03-06T04:23:16Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > I assume you mean “male” and “female”, since the subject of this thread is sex, and not gender. > > If so, can we have a cite to support your claim that \>95% people with CY chromosomes are not female? > > Becoz I am calling bullshit. > > Cite please. > > Seriously, please provide this evidence that there is confusion in the scientific community as to whether \>95% of people are male or female. > I am calling bullshit on this claim. > > So what? > > This is about the 10th time someone has asked you this. > > What exactly is your point here? You keep repeating references to the 1 in 5000 that have such conditions as though it’s some sort of a gotcha, but you refuse to actually tell us what the gotcha is. > > For the love of God, please just stop being coy and tell us what point you think you are making with these ceaseless references to the 0.018% of people whose genitals don’t match there genetic sex. > > Because so far you have utterly failed to make any point at all. I know you are capable of communicating clearly when you want to, so I have to question why you drag us through 2 pages of obfuscation rather than just telling us what you think a 0.018% deviation allows you to conclude. Blake, I never made either of those claims you said j made regarding 95% of people. I don’t understand why you would even think I made them The point I am making, as j have consistently repeated.throughout this thread, is that it is curious that people who claim that race is a myth do not also claim that gender/sex is a myth when they are both based on subjective criteria. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/98 "2012-03-06T04:27:44Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > You’re questioning why people (well, the “race is a myth” people) aren’t up in arms about an argument no-one is making? > > And the reasons why this is not an example of doublethink have been offered to you repeatedly, in the form of explanations of the genetics of sex and the genetics of race, and how they differ, which as it turns out is quite a bit. I am questioning why they are not consistent. If they believe race is a myth, they should also believe gender/sex is a myth. And my refutation of those reasons have been offered to you and others repeatedly. You and others don’t seem to want to listen (so instead you respond using constructions such as in this post, where you attempt to portray me as ignoring easy facts that have been “offered to me” :rolleyes:). ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/99 "2012-03-06T04:33:08Z")
Nathan Jawai has _got_ to be “black,” right? [http://www.nba.com/media/act\_nathan\_jawai.jpg](http://www.nba.com/media/act_nathan_jawai.jpg) [![](http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_W-IT-ByXv4I/S9B7sSjxx_I/AAAAAAAAAM8/MgsIt62nBSE/s1600/Nathan_Jawai_NBA_Draft.jpg) ](http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_W-IT-ByXv4I/S9B7sSjxx_I/AAAAAAAAAM8/MgsIt62nBSE/s1600/Nathan_Jawai_NBA_Draft.jpg) [http://trialx.com/curetalk/wp-content/blogs.dir/7/files/2011/07/sports/Nathan\_Jawai-3.jpg](http://trialx.com/curetalk/wp-content/blogs.dir/7/files/2011/07/sports/Nathan_Jawai-3.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/100 "2012-03-06T04:43:37Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > … (ii) have blatantly misunderstood easy points I made (like the sentence about the temperature of water), indicating that you may be doing so on purpose. Since I am not the only person here who is utterly mystified as to what the hell point you are trying to make, perhaps it’s worth considering your argument style, rather than assuming that we are all deliberately misunderstanding you. :rolleyes: > [@](#): > > Wrong. I’m not “unable” to do so. As I keep explaining to you, a person doing a study can create any number of races they want to, from one to the number of humans that has ever existed. So I say that you are unable to tell us how many races there are. And you retort that you are not “unable” to do so, it’s “just” that the number is somewhere between one to the number of humans that has ever existed. But that isn’t an ability to tell us how many there are. Let’s just get this straight shall we? An uncertainty of _12 orders of magnitude_ is, in your opinion, an accurate and responsive answer? > [@](#): > > You believe this based on a circular argument. You believe that “race is a myth,” so you dismiss out of hand any study that finds a difference among people of different races. Wrong. There are no studies that find objective differences among people of different races beyond the objective characteristics used to define the race in the first place. If you believe other wise then please provide references. Show us these studies that found objective differences among people of different races that were not inherently tied to the objective definition of race being used in the study. > [@](#): > > Many Asian folks have eyelids that look different than those of white people and black people etc. Cite. Show us this evidence that many Asian folk have eyelids that are not identical in appearance from those found in Africans, Polynesians, Northern Europeans, Native Americans and Aboriginal Australians. I’ll even make it easy for you. I’ll allow “many” to be as low as 5%. Show us your evidence that 5% of Asians have an eyelid shape that is not found at frequencies \>5% in any region outside of Asia. > [@](#): > > ..maybe their livers work slightly differently as well in certain contexts.. And maybe they have wheels. But there is no more evidence for these claims than for your earlier claim that there is a uniquely Asian eye shape. > [@](#): > > But you’ll never learn that if you just wave your hands and dismiss any study the results of which are “some asian people have different livers.” Well how about we start with your premises and work out from there. When you can show me your evidence that there is an eye shape common to 5% of Asians that is not anywhere outside Asia, then we can talk about whether anybody is dismissing it. Because at the moment all you have is a baseless assertion that such a thing even exists. And I am calling bullshit because I do not believe such a thing does exist. > [@](#): > > That’s a fairly ridiculous assertion. I think aliens would be able to at least see that black and white and asian people look different than each other, assuming they can perceive differences among humans in the same way that humans can. Really? If it’s so ridiculous then you can tell me whether [these people](http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2009/1/30/1233309559346/Sri-Lankan-army-soldiers--001.jpg) are Black, White or Asian, and what characteristics you used to make that classifictaion. Then you can tell me whether [this person](http://www.africawithin.com/mandela/mandela1.jpg)is Black, White or Asian, and what characteristics you used to make that classification. Then you can tell me whether [these people](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/Libyan_Arabs.jpg) are Black, White or Asian, and what characteristics you used to make that classification. Then you can tell me whether [these people](http://www.shoalhaven.net.au/~mwsmith/timorese_kids.gif) are Black, White or Asian, and what characteristics you used to make that classification. Then you can tell me whether [thus person](http://www.ehpea.org.et/images/ethiopian-girl.jpg) is Black, White or Asian, and what characteristics you used to make that classification. You’ve made the claim that anybody can readily divide humanity Black, White or Asian based on appearance. Then prove it to us. Tell us what in the appearance of those people allows you to classify them? Note that these people were not picked as trick examples. They are basically the fist appropriate image found on Google. People like these make up the vast majority of humanity. So, please tell us what race they are, and how you divined that from appearance. If you can’t so of course then your claim that aliens would immediately know they are Asian is utterly ridiculous. If you can’t do it with your pre-existing knowledge of what an Asian looks like, is ridiculous to claim that an Alien species can do so. > [@](#): > > You are so sure about that only because you dismiss out of hand studies that show those results based on their “fallacious” use of race (i.e., the circular logic you use, as discussed above). I am so sure about it because you are utterly unable to tell us what characteristics you used to assign those people to the Asian “race”. You already think you know what an Asian is. Yet when confronted with actual typical Asians, you are utterly unable to objectively assign them to the Asian race rather than some mythical “black” race. > [@](#): > > Again, you simply need more education on this point. You are failing to appreciate gender/sex in all its vagaries and complications. That is no response at all. You haven’t actually addressed the issues I raised. You are simply asserting that they are wrong because I don’t know enough. That’s hardly going to convince anyone, in the light of a peer reviewed journal article saying that less than 1 in 500 people actually have genitals that don’t correspond to their genetic sex. > [@](#): > > Plenty of socieities recognize more than one gender/sex. One example is the hijira in India. So I make post stating that plenty of societies have more than two categories of sex, and your response is that plenty of societies recognise more than one gender/sex. What exactly do you think you are achieving by agreeing with me in this manner? > [@](#): > > I responded to this in my previous reply. Of course a test for gender/sex is objective once you’ve defined “male” to include only “people with XY chromosomes.” OK, so now you promise to stop endlessly repeating your claim that there no objective tests for sex? > [@](#): > > But it is subjective if you look at all the variables, and coming up with an objective test like that described above is a subjective exercise in the first place. What does that even mean? Seriously, I have no idea what that is meant to mean. You say that a simple genetic test looking at just one pair of chromosomes is objective, then you say that some other test that looks at all the variables is subjective. So what? This is yet another straw man. We aren’t talking about whether you can create subjective tests for sex. Of course you can do that. The issue is whether we can create objective tests. A point that you have now conceded. Once you concede that there is a simple, objective test for sex that is not self-referential, that immediately falsifies your position. The debate is over. That is the difference between sex and race. Sex has a biological validity because there exists an objective test for sex that is not purely self-referential. By grouping individuals as male or female based solely on objective criteria, you also learn things about \>95% of them beyond the criterion you used to group them in the first place. Race has no biological validity because there exists no objective test that is not purely self-referential.Any grouping individuals as Asian or Black or White based solely on objective criteria tells you nothing at all about 95% of them beyond the criterion you used to group them in the first place. That is the difference. that is why sex has a biological meaning and race has no biological meaning. 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