Per wiki lots of women ave Adam’s Apples & many men don’t. Why is this considered such an accurate "tell’ of gender when it’s not?
Is there a more accurate one, that doesn’t involve stripping?
The Adam’s apple = thyroid cartilage, in medical. The thyroid cartilage’s name came first; the thyroid gland was named because it was near the thyroid cartilage. Thyros = shield in Greek.
Of course everyone has a thyroid cartilage. You couldn’t get air from your pharynx to your trachea if you didn’t. When men strangle women, they frequently put a midline crack in the narrow “peak” of the thyroid cartilage at the same time as they break one ala of the hyoid bone. I have seen a strangling case in which I could only see the hemorrhagic fracture line from the inside of the thyroid cartilage. (Plenty of other signs - huge bruises in sterncleidomastoid muscles, etc. etc.)
However, in men, on average, the thyroid cartilage is larger and comes to a more prominent peak. I have no idea how the two bell curves for distribution of size and prominence of men’s and women’s thyroid cartilages compare. I am sure there are some men with smaller thyroid cartilages than some women. It’s probably a pretty decent comparison point on average.
My uncle, who admitted to his lifelong transsexualism and converted to female at the age of sixty-three (one of the oldest in Australia ever to do so), said her problems with being refused work in child care were mostly related to people suspecting her previous gender because of her hands. Size and coarseness of the hands were the problem. She had her beard electrotweezed (had to sell her car to afford it) and it was rare that anyone mentioned her Adam’s apple.
In male skeletons, usually, all the bony ridges where muscles attached during life are more prominent and come to a higher peak than in most female skeletons, because testosterone made the muscles bigger, and they pulled harder. But it’s only a secondary or tertiary evidence for gender. Pelvis much more important. Size of the femoral head. That kind of thing.
We can’t use the thyroid cartilage to compare skeletons because, like most cartilage, it quietly goes away along with the rest of the flesh, long before the person is a skeleton.
I don’t have a noticeable Adam’s apple, and I’m only 5’ 4" and have smallish hands, but I’m sure there are other ways people “in the know” would spot me. My pan, mostly.
Once in art school, when I was in my 20s, the teacher had me and a male student stand up in front of the class (fully clothed, mind you!) and used us to point out the skeletal and musculature differences between men and women.
I was amused.
(gabriela, good-o on your aunt!)
[snork]
I’m very proud of her, and her courage is a testament. However, that doesn’t change the fact that she’s God-damned annoying. Just like her mother.
I’m not sure if this is a reference to cookware or to a pet chimpanzee, and I can’t see how either would serve as a gender indicator. Help, please?
Do you have a source better than that wiki article to prove it’s not a highly accurate gender indicator? All that article says it that the protrusion itself is not a secondary sex characteristic and that some females have large protrusions and some men don’t.
How much is some? What is the percent? Large enough to not consider it “highly accurate”. Some women dont have breasts and some males do. But it’s still a pretty good indicator.
Also, there are too many things in this discussion that are not quantitative. For instance, how big is “large”. What size makes it “prominant”. All the article says is that the specific protrusion that is technically the Adam’s Apple, is not a secondary sex characteristic. But it admits, that an enlargining of the larynx is. A larger larynx would make the protrusion stick out more. It also states the Adam’s Apple is more common in males.
So are there any statistics to show that it really isn’t an accurate indicator?
My pan: my map, my phiz, my kisser, my mug.
More N’Yawk/Noo Jhhsey talk.
Not being from Newyawk, I have to ask:
Map: ?
Phiz: physiognomy?
Kisser: lips?
Mug: face?
Aw, dang. I was hoping you were talking about making bread en la cocina.
I ain’t from Jersey, either, but da lady’s tawkin about her face.