Cont: Transwomen are not women part XII (also merged)

[Samson]

Without starting yet another sub-debate a lot of the issue is that we lump two (to me anyway) very different things under the vague term "trans."

I've always said that a biological X who defines as Y and is actively going through steps to make actual physical changes to their body; reassignment surgery, hormone treatment, etc makes absolutely 100% perfect sense because it recognizes that actual, objective, physiological changes have to be made to turn from an X into a Y.

We could quibble over whether or not it "counts" or whether or not any amount of effort really can fully change a pure X into a pure Y, but at least they are acknowledging that actual, real, objective, non-internal change has to happen.

"I'm an X but now I'm a Y and that change occurred the moment I changed my completely internal self identity and I have no intentions of making any changes beyond that and still demand to be literally thought of as a Y" is where my issue has always lay.

You mean changing religions nothing more nothing less

 

[theprestige]

Why would it? This thread isn't about transvesticism.

I've been wondering about this for years now. For whatever reason, cross-dressing seems to be an important part of expressing transgender identity. It sure seems like some transwomen - e.g., Rachel Levine, Lia Thomas - are making the argument that a transwoman is a woman if he dresses (stereotypically) like a woman. How can the question of whether transwomen are women, and therefore this thread, not be at least partly about the role transvestism plays in transgender expression?

 

[TurkeysGhost]

We're straying somewhat from the topic but not all the way from it.

I suppose that depends on your point of view.

Much of what is being said in this thread could best be summarized as "biological essentialism", that is, that the binary reality of biological sex is pretty much the only thing that is relevant and gender, if it even exists separately from sex, is a distant secondary concern at best.

Obviously this is not the position I take, so discussing things like the changing view of what constitutes gender expression (like clothing) is entirely relevant.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Well and that brings us back to the question I asked long, long ago in the distant past when this debate first started, when we were all fresh face children pushing hoops down the road with sticks.

What quality, factor, variable, ANYTHING of being the other sex does a trans person actually have to meet?

There HAS to be a variable (and no entirely internal personal identity does not count) between a biological X who identifies as an X and a biological X who identifies as a Y and I've come to the conclusion I'll have to reanimate James Randi and get him to loan me the million dollar prize as a bribe before I'll ever get an answer.

Because there's no answer. There's never been an answer. The question has been answered by removing every possible actual meaning from the term "man" and "woman" to the point that neither of those words has any meaning. The question "Is a transwoman a woman?" has been answered with "How many transwomen can dance on the head of pin?"

"I was born a man, but now I identify as a woman." Okay. What changed? What variable of "woman" have you taken on? There has to be one of this is this biggest nothing in the history of nothing.

And all I'll get is a mumbled "Mumble It's complicated mumble mumble mumble stop asking mumble mumble."

 

[JoeMorgue]

Much of what is being said in this thread could best be summarized as "biological essentialism", that is, that the binary reality of biological sex is pretty much the only thing that is relevant and gender, if it even exists separately from sex, is a distant secondary concern at best.

My opinion is, always has been, and baring some massive change in information always will be that trans people don't get sexual and gender stereotypes that only they get to use and more and more that's what all of this sounds like. "Gender stereotypes exist, but only for trans people to use" which is not how reality works.

 

[Ziggurat]

This is not true. It's still right there in the DSM V.

BTW, I don't think this is true. DSM 5 has a section on "transvestic disorder", but I don't see the word "transvestite" anywhere. And there is a distinction, and it's not trivial. Transvestic disorder involves specifically a sexual arousal from cross-dressing. A transvestite might or might not experience sexual arousal from cross-dressing. So transvestites don't necessarily have transvestic disorder.

 

[theprestige]

Well and that brings us back to the question I asked long, long ago in the distant past when this debate first started, when we were all fresh face children pushing hoops down the road with sticks.

What quality, factor, variable, ANYTHING of being the other sex does a trans person actually have to meet?

There HAS to be a variable (and no entirely internal personal identity does not count) between a biological X who identifies as an X and a biological X who identifies as a Y and I've come to the conclusion I'll have to reanimate James Randi and get him to loan me the million dollar prize as a bribe before I'll ever get an answer.

Because there's no answer. There's never been an answer. The question has been answered by removing every possible actual meaning from the term "man" and "woman" to the point.

"I was born a man, but no I identify as a woman." Okay. What changed? What variable of "woman" have you taken on? There has to be one of this is this biggest nothing in the history of nothing.

And all I'll get is a mumbled "Mumble It's complicated mumble mumble mumble stop asking mumble mumble."

Hence my conclusion that for all practical purposes, transgenderism is really transsexualism. Sex is a clearly definable, binary thing. Sex segregation is an easy line to describe and cross. It's no surprise that this is where we see any kind of concrete, practical application of "I know what I am and you have to accommodate it."

 

[TurkeysGhost]

Well and that brings us back to the question I asked long, long ago in the distant past when this debate first started, when we were all fresh face children pushing hoops down the road with sticks.

What quality, factor, variable, ANYTHING of being the other sex does a trans person actually have to meet?

There HAS to be a variable (and no entirely internal personal identity does not count) between a biological X who identifies as an X and a biological X who identifies as a Y and I've come to the conclusion I'll have to reanimate James Randi and get him to loan me the million dollar prize as a bribe before I'll ever get an answer.

Because there's no answer. There's never been an answer. The question has been answered by removing every possible actual meaning from the term "man" and "woman" to the point.

"I was born a man, but no I identify as a woman." Okay. What changed? What variable of "woman" have you taken on? There has to be one of this is this biggest nothing in the history of nothing.

And all I'll get is a mumbled "Mumble It's complicated mumble mumble mumble stop asking mumble mumble."

The obvious variable is the expressed self-identity of the person involved.

What exactly does it mean to be gay? For a lot of these kinds of questions you kinda just have to accept that people know their own minds, even if that's not at all confirmable by strictly outside observation.

It's right there in the difference between sex and gender, where sex is fairly straightforward and gender is more nuanced. Sure, it's in large part socially encoded, and that makes things more complicated, but so what?

 

[theprestige]

BTW, I don't think this is true. DSM 5 has a section on "transvestic disorder", but I don't see the word "transvestite" anywhere. And there is a distinction, and it's not trivial. Transvestic disorder involves specifically a sexual arousal from cross-dressing. A transvestite might or might not experience sexual arousal from cross-dressing. So transvestites don't necessarily have transvestic disorder.

Maybe the real question is not whether transwomen are women, but whether autogynaephiliacs and gender dysphorics and people suffering from transvestic disorder are women.

 

[d4m10n]

Much of what is being said in this thread could best be summarized as "biological essentialism", that is, that the binary reality of biological sex is pretty much the only thing that is relevant and gender, if it even exists separately from sex, is a distant secondary concern at best.

I don't recall anyone actually making this argument across the board rather than in particular contexts (e.g. eligibility for women's rugby or nude spas).

I'd happily admit that sometimes gender is more relevant than sex and sometimes it's vice-versa. The ACLU, by contrast, has stated that gender identity should always trump biological sex in law and policy.

Sent from my Cheval Taipan using Tapatalk

 

[theprestige]

I don't recall anyone actually making this argument across the board rather than in particular contexts (e.g. eligibility for women's rugby or nude spas).

I would say that I'm making this argument across the board, and then applying it to specific contexts. That is, because sex is essential and gender is not, transwomen are not women in contexts where sex matters. And also there are no contexts in which gender matters, except as a proxy for sex.

 

[mumblethrax]

BTW, I don't think this is true. DSM 5 has a section on "transvestic disorder", but I don't see the word "transvestite" anywhere. And there is a distinction, and it's not trivial. Transvestic disorder involves specifically a sexual arousal from cross-dressing. A transvestite might or might not experience sexual arousal from cross-dressing. So transvestites don't necessarily have transvestic disorder.

I think that is the lay sense these days. We don't commonly refer to drag queens as transvestites, precisely because it implies something beyond merely crossdressing.

 

[JoeMorgue]

The obvious variable is the expressed self-identity of the person involved.

What exactly does it mean to be gay? I mean, for a lot of these kinds of questions you kinda just have to accept that people know their own minds, even if that's not at all confirmable by strictly outside observation.

It's right there in the difference between sex and gender, where sex is fairly straightforward and gender is more nuanced.

Nope, we've been over this a hundred times.

If someone said "I'm Gay" but they dated, married, were sexually attracted to, had sex with, fantasized, consumed pornography about, romantized about, etc only the opposite sex, nobody would be bigoted for questioning their gayness.

Gay has qualities you have to meet beyond pure self identity. It is NOT just a label people can slap on themselves and meet zero other criteria.

"Tee hee, lol what does it mean to be gay?" Please. Being gay means you are sexually attracted to the same sex, it's exactly 0% complicated.

Words mean things and this is not an evil or bigoted concept.

If you tell someone who eats meat they aren't a vegetarian you aren't "mis-fooding" them.

If you tell someone who writes, pitches, shoots, opens doors, and jerks off only with their right hand that they aren't left handed you aren't "mis-handing them."

If you tell a married man who can't call himself a bachelor you aren't "mis...errr martial statusing" him.

If you call a shape with 4 equal sides and 4 right angle corners a square and not a circle you aren't being bigoted.

 

[TurkeysGhost]

Nope, we've been over this a hundred times.

If someone said "I'm Gay" but they dated, married, were sexually attracted to, had sex with, fantasized, consumed pornography only the opposite sex, nobody would be bigoted for questioning their gayness.

Gay has qualities you have to meet beyond pure self identity. It is NOT just a label people can slap on themselves and meet zero other criteria.

"Tee hee, lol what does it mean to be gay?" Please. Being gay means you are sexually attracted to the same sex, it's exactly 0% complicated.

Words mean things and this is not an evil or bigoted concept.

I agree that a gay person can know this about themselves, but how can you, the outside observer, know? They could just be lying. hell, many gay people were lying, quite convincingly for years, claiming to be straight back in the closeted days. Gay people did date, marry, have sex with, and have children with women. Nothing stops them from doing so other than their own sense of self identity and knowing their own mind.

 

[JoeMorgue]

I agree that a gay person can know this about themselves, but how can you, the outside observer, know? They could just be lying. hell, many gay people were lying, quite convincingly for years, claiming to be straight back in the closeted days. Gay people did date, marry, have sex with, and have children with women. Nothing stops them from doing so other than their own sense of self identity and knowing their own mind.

My Dad was gayer then Elton John mud wrestling Paul Lynde while Truman Capote wrote a novel about the song Liberace was writing about it and still managed to have me. You're preaching to the choir.

But an unknown variable and no possible variables aren't the same thing.

The closet can't be eternal on a philosophical level, even if it is practically.

 

[TurkeysGhost]

But an unknown variable and no possible variables aren't the same thing.

The closet can't be eternal on a philosophical level, even if it is practically.

You've lost me here.

 

[JoeMorgue]

You've lost me here.

Gay still has a definition. It can be hidden, it can be suppressed, it can be lied about, you can whisper it into a mason jar and bury it in the moors on a moonless night so no human being ever see it, but the definition is still there.

No such definition exists for trans, outside of the "Purely with zero other context sense of personal identity" already rejected.

There's no difference between "I identity as a X" and "I want to be an X."

 

[theprestige]

The obvious variable is the expressed self-identity of the person involved.

Gender is a social construct, no?

The other obvious variable is the perceived identity of the persons observing the person involved.

 

[TurkeysGhost]

Gay still has a definition. It can be hidden, it can be suppressed, it can be lied about, you can whisper it into a mason jar and bury it in the moors on a moonless night so no human being ever see it, but the definition is still there.

No such definition exists for trans, outside of the "Purely with zero other context sense of personal identity" already rejected.

There's no difference between "I identity as a X" and "I want to be an X."

Kinda seems like there's a very straightforward definition: someone who identifies with the gender opposite their sex. (or, more strongly, is the gender opposite their sex)

 

[Lplus]

Yes. "On or to". Not "on." Which has implications for your argument.

To use your example of transatlantic, the journey is across the Atlantic and the destination would be the USA or Europe, so transwoman used in that sense would be a journey from a gender to another gender via woman. Which is nonsense.

Enough of the pedantry.