Discussion: Transwomen are not women (Part 7)

[Emily's Cat]

I disagree,
from what I can work out, woman is a gender label so rpg it, whatever.
Human? Won't anyone think about the A.I's?

Female is a physical description, I don't think that can rpg'ed at all.

A female is a female, a male is a male, everything else seems to be a variable.

So... a mare is a horse that feels like a mare, and likes the gender label of mare, regardless of whether they are a male or a female horse? A drake can be either a male or a female duck, so long as they prefer the gender label of drake?

Are you certain that your milk is coming from a female bovine? Are you sure it's not coming from a male bovine that simply doesn't identify as a steer?

We have terms for male and female members of many different species, to distinguish their sex and maturity quickly. A filly is a female horse that is not sexually mature; a mare is a female horse that is sexually mature. A colt is a male horse that is not sexually mature; a stallion is a male horse that is sexually mature and intact; a gelding is a male horse that is sexually mature and neutered.

The idea that we can't have a single word for a sexually mature female human, a sexually immature female human, a sexually mature male human, or a sexually immature male human is strange. It's also a bit insulting - we are robbed of our humanity when you make the terms woman, man, girl, and boy into terms of self-selection divorced from our sex.

 

[p0lka]

Indeed, and being female is just as much a component of being a "Woman" as being an Adult, or being a Human is.
If all three conditions are not met- the person is "presenting as", or "believing themselves to be" or even "pretending to be" a Woman. Which is fine by me. But they are not, objectively, a "Woman" unless they are Female, Adult, and Human.

Ah, ok.
The way I look at it, is as gender labels like 'woman' or 'man' are just variables that people can choose depending on how they want to interact with society and to be treated.

Male or female on the other hand, are not labels at all, they're physical descriptions of reality.

I'm fine with the gender label not matching the reality, the label is just to let you know how they want to be treated. You seem to be saying the label has to match reality, is that correct?

 

[Emily's Cat]

If being a little bit squicked out by the prospect of cock-sex with someone in the uncanny valley between male and female makes me a transphobe, then a transphobe is what I am.

Heterosexuals don't have to apologize to anyone for their sexual turn-ons and turn-offs. Homosexuals don't have to justify their sexual attractions to any damn person. Transsexuals don't have to apologize. Why should cissexuals have to?

The part that made me giggle was this bit:

Of the seven participants who themselves identified as transgender or nonbinary, 89% were willing to date another trans person.

11% of transgender people aren't willing to date transgender people. I mean, small sample size and all but still.

Hmm. You can't get 89% out of 7 respondents. That's 6.23 people. Maybe they've got a quadriplegic in there and are only counting them as 23% of a people?

 

[Emily's Cat]

If you define woman as a gender role, does that mean a female person who doesn't perform that gender role isn't a woman?

Given that I don't wear skirts, heels, or stockings, don't curl or style my hair, don't wear makeup, and think that pink is a horrid color, I suppose the best I can hope for is nonbinary, despite my currently-quite-angry uterus and fully functional female biology.

 

[theprestige]

Ah, ok.
The way I look at it, is as gender labels like 'woman' or 'man' are just variables that people can choose depending on how they want to interact with society and to be treated.

Male or female on the other hand, are not labels at all, they're physical descriptions of reality.

I'm fine with the gender label not matching the reality, the label is just to let you know how they want to be treated. You seem to be saying the label has to match reality, is that correct?

The problem is that the label absolutely **** ing useless for telling you how they want to be treated..

Pop Quiz: How do women want to be treated? What does it mean to treat someone like a woman?

 

[p0lka]

If you define woman as a gender role, does that mean a female person who doesn't perform that gender role isn't a woman?

It's a gender role, it's entirely up to them. Which is kind of the point.
EDIT:
ah ****, I should just say gender label instead of role, as role gives the wrong impression. I do not mean anyone having to act a certain way or anything. More just being happy with who you feel you are.

 

[Distracted1]

Ah, ok.
The way I look at it, is as gender labels like 'woman' or 'man' are just variables that people can choose depending on how they want to interact with society and to be treated.

Male or female on the other hand, are not labels at all, they're physical descriptions of reality.

I'm fine with the gender label not matching the reality, the label is just to let you know how they want to be treated. You seem to be saying the label has to match reality, is that correct?

If the label does not correctly define that which it is labelling- it is at best a fiction, and at worst a lie.
"Man" and "Woman" are just as much descriptions of reality as are "Male" and "Female".

I am not fine with terms that are used as descriptions of reality not matching reality itself as closely as possible.
If the title of the thread were something akin to: "Trans-women should have all the rights of Women", or "Trans Women should be viewed as Women under the law" I would have different takes on it, but the title of the thread is "Trans Women are Women"- A false proposition from Jump Street.

 

[theprestige]

It's a gender role, it's entirely up to them. Which is kind of the point.

If it's a role, then it's up to the audience.

 

[Emily's Cat]

It's a gender role, it's entirely up to them. Which is kind of the point.

Let's assume for the moment that you are correct, and that anyone can select any gender role they want, whenever they want. And that by so doing, they compel other people to treat them the way they imagine that gender role to merit.

What should happen when an adult human male, with fully intact male genitalia, with not hormone treatment at all, adopts the gender label of "woman"?

If they believe that the proper treatment for their view of "woman" is that they are now allowed into female locker rooms, around naked human females of all ages... are they then entitled to such treatment? Are human females obligated to accept them into their private spaces, because they have adopted the gender label of "woman"?

 

[p0lka]

The problem is that the label absolutely **** ing useless for telling you how they want to be treated..

Pop Quiz: How do women want to be treated? What does it mean to treat someone like a woman?

Well that's an easy question, women or men would prefer people to treat them with the correct pronouns, for instance.

 

[JoeMorgue]

What should happen when an adult human male, with fully intact male genitalia, with not hormone treatment at all, adopts the gender label of "woman"?

Good luck.

I've literally been asking this question for 10 threads and as many years at this point and have never gotten an answer, just a mealy-mouth, pettifogging spiral of "Well it's complected you see self-identity... er stop asking you transphobe."

I have person X who has a penis and an XY chromosome who identifies as male.

I have person Y who has a penis and an XY chromosome who identifies as female.

I've asked, begged, screamed, appealed to, everything short of bribed someone, anyone to tell me what the difference is between those people and how I am supposed to treat them differently. I've never gotten an answer.

 

[p0lka]

EDIT:
ah ****, I should just say gender label instead of role, as role gives the wrong impression. I do not mean anyone having to act a certain way or anything. More just being happy with who you feel you are.
My fault, sorry.

 

[Distracted1]

Well that's an easy question, women or men would prefer people to treat them with the correct pronouns, for instance.

Yet some express a desire (even insist) that the incorrect pronouns be used when they are being referred to in the third person. Which makes your sweeping assertion far from a universal truth.

 

[theprestige]

Well that's an easy question, women or men would prefer people to treat them with the correct pronouns, for instance.

If that's the most significant thing you can think of, then the gender label is indeed useless.

What even is a "correct" pronoun? There is no such thing. Just my preference, and you doing me a courtesy.

I note that you have completely avoided any substantive answer to the question of what it means to be treated as a woman. Which is understandable, since there is no substantive answer.

 

[JoeMorgue]

EDIT:
ah ****, I should just say gender label instead of role, as role gives the wrong impression. I do not mean anyone having to act a certain way or anything. More just being happy with who you feel you are.
My fault, sorry.

Please explain the difference between "gender" and "gender label."

I mean we already had words for all of this. Sex and gender.

Sex is what you are and, outside of some major surgery, doesn't change no matter how hard you close your eyes and wish upon a star.

Gender is what society expects out of you and was about 100% bullcrap within a rounding error. You can, and should, defy it as much as you are comfortable with. Let your freak flag fly and all that. I've got your back on that.

Until the great transgender retconning trying to reword two words over and over to create a "sex/gender soul" in there as a third axis.

 

[Olmstead]

When a woman wears a pink dress, you should comment on how cute she looks.

When a man wears a pink dress, you should gasp and have your monocle drop into your earl gray.

When a transwoman wears a pink dress, you should comment on how cute she looks.

Gah, it's so easy. Peasants.

 

[JoeMorgue]

"I thought sex and gender stereotypes were bad."
"Not when you're using them ironically!"

Would it help clarify things if instead of transgender we just called them gender hipsters?

 

[p0lka]

Good luck.

I've literally been asking this question for 10 threads and as many years at this point and have never gotten an answer, just a mealy-mouth, pettifogging spiral of "Well it's complected you see self-identity... er stop asking you transphobe."

I have person X who has a penis and an XY chromosome who identifies as male.

I have person Y who has a penis and an XY chromosome who identifies as female.

I've asked, begged, screamed, appealed to, everything short of bribed someone, anyone to tell me what the difference is between those people and how I am supposed to treat them differently. I've never gotten an answer.

male and female are physical facts, you can't identify as them as they are not variables.
Man/woman/other though? they are gender labels and seem to be variables.

If X wants to be treated as a man and Y wants to be treated as a woman then I'm happy to oblige.

If that's the most significant thing you can think of, then the gender label is indeed useless.

What even is a "correct" pronoun? There is no such thing. Just my preference, and you doing me a courtesy.

yeah, that's what correct means in this context.

I note that you have completely avoided any substantive answer to the question of what it means to be treated as a woman. Which is understandable, since there is no substantive answer.

I said it's a variable, treat people how they want to be treated.

 

[Emily's Cat]

EDIT:
ah ****, I should just say gender label instead of role, as role gives the wrong impression. I do not mean anyone having to act a certain way or anything. More just being happy with who you feel you are.
My fault, sorry.

I get the place you're coming from, p0lka. And it's a very nice and compassionate place.

The challenge is that self-identification, adopting a gender label based on feelings alone, results in a conflict. Specifically, gender identity frequently conflicts with sex class. At the end of the day, a male who identifies as a woman is not actually female. And vice versa.

Which leads to situations where one or the other of those characteristics needs to take precedence.

So let's start with my current top issue: prisons.

Prisons have long been sex-segregated. They haven't been separated on the basis of gender label or gender identity, but on objective sex. Over the past few years, that has changed, and several US states, along with Canada, and parts of the UK & Ireland, have decided that prisoners should be housed according to their gender identity, rather than their sex. I, along with nearly all female inmates, think this is a monumentally bad idea that puts female prisoners at risk.

What are your thoughts on how gender identity should be handled in prisons?

 

[JoeMorgue]

If X wants to be treated as a man and Y wants to be treated as a woman then I'm happy to oblige.

So you treat men and women differently?

*Cue massive backpedal that no that's totally different...*