Non-binary identities are valid

[shuttlt]

Cases where biological sex is inaccurately determined at birth are exceptionally rare. They are not driving the transgender and gender identity debates.

Caster Semenya

 

[theprestige]

Not in the US, it isn't. I doubt it is in Germany either. And I also doubt that where it DOES matter for those issues they take the ideas of "gender identity" as different than biological sex seriously to begin with.

The one exception that springs to mind is Albania, at least historically. Apparently some Albanian communities take (or took) the issue of gender identity as different from biological sex very seriously. In these highly patriarchal communities, there were necessary social duties that could only be fulfilled by men. Families that did not have a man to fulfill these duties could put forward a woman instead - but she was then required to live as a man.

But this is the only example I know of, where a community takes biological sex seriously for social purposes, and also takes the difference between biological sex and gender identity seriously for social purposes.

 

[TragicMonkey]

The birth certificate is often the original source of truth for other medical records.

And a checkbox that accurately reflects the biological sex of the patient is probably the most useful thing.

Do you really believe the purpose of the biological sex field on the form is to advise the medical staff on how to address the patient? Do you really believe that is the path to good medical outcomes?

Also, if gender is so fluid, then how can their stated gender possibly contain reliable information about how they should be addressed? Isn't it presumptuous to assume that because a person has an "M" on their chart, they want to be addressed as "Sir"?

Also, is it really a good idea to burden medical staff with all the complexities and nuances of personal pronouns? Shouldn't medical records serve to clear the doctor's mind of irrelevancies, and help them to focus on what actually matters to the health of the patient?

Speaking as someone whose job is medical record data, I can answer some of these:

1. Your EMR doesn't include your birth certificate. Birth certificates are legal documents the states care about, and use for identification purposes. EMR don't care, except when it comes to issuing them for patients who've given birth. It's a task to do, not perusal of Holy Writ.

2. EMRs have a lot of fields, and easily accommodate both a sex field and a "how to address" field. And the sex field can contain more than just M and F. If you're a biological male who prefers to be addressed by female pronouns and are also a VIP celebrity all of that can be accommodated. There are even special flags that can show up at the top of the screen if there's something vital to bear in mind, like your exotic disease or extraordinary fatness. Nobody spends hundreds of millions of dollars implementing an EMR application that can't handle multiple situations, even if oldtimey grandma never heard of such a thing in all her born days.

 

[shuttlt]

The one exception that springs to mind is Albania, at least historically. Apparently some Albanian communities take (or took) the issue of gender identity as different from biological sex very seriously. In these highly patriarchal communities, there were necessary social duties that could only be fulfilled by men. Families that did not have a man to fulfill these duties could put forward a woman instead - but she was then required to live as a man.

But this is the only example I know of, where a community takes biological sex seriously for social purposes, and also takes the difference between biological sex and gender identity seriously for social purposes.

It doesn't sound like they care about gender identity, so much as gender performance.

 

[theprestige]

Caster Semenya : D

Caster Semenya is a runner, not a driver. Maybe you're thinking of Pippa Mann? : D

 

[TragicMonkey]

It doesn't sound like they care about gender identity, so much as gender performance.

You can get the best performance out of your gender by changing the oil every three thousand miles.

 

[theprestige]

Speaking as someone whose job is medical record data, I can answer some of these:

1. Your EMR doesn't include your birth certificate. Birth certificates are legal documents the states care about, and use for identification purposes. EMR don't care, except when it comes to issuing them for patients who've given birth. It's a task to do, not perusal of Holy Writ.

2. EMRs have a lot of fields, and easily accommodate both a sex field and a "how to address" field. And the sex field can contain more than just M and F. If you're a biological male who prefers to be addressed by female pronouns and are also a VIP celebrity all of that can be accommodated. There are even special flags that can show up at the top of the screen if there's something vital to bear in mind, like your exotic disease or extraordinary fatness. Nobody spends hundreds of millions of dollars implementing an EMR application that can't handle multiple situations, even if oldtimey grandma never heard of such a thing in all her born days.

Thanks! I'll start updating my assumptions about medical records.

 

[theprestige]

It doesn't sound like they care about gender identity, so much as gender performance.

Everything I've read about the practice suggests that they care very much about which gender they identify as.

This is the first time I've seen an attempt to distinguish between "gender identity" and "gender performance". I don't really see the value. In the context of what Zig and I and Earthborn are talking about, I don't even see the difference.

 

[Belz...]

This is the first time I've seen an attempt to distinguish between "gender identity" and "gender performance". I don't really see the value.

Gender fractality!

 

[TragicMonkey]

Thanks! I'll start updating my assumptions about medical records.

I know you're being sarcastic, but they're actually a lot more interesting than people realize. I've spent my career messing around with huge datasets in everything from education demographics to radio station listener stats, and none of them have been as richly fascinating as medical record data. All the complexity of the human body and medicine combined with all the complexity of trying to quantify and classify...it's great!

 

[d4m10n]

Yeah but I was talking about gender. Apparently it's completely distinct from biological sex but I can never get a precise definition of what it is. Invariably I get the definition of gender identity or gender presentation or gender role, but not gender itself.

I think most people are using these two interchangeably, most of the time.

 

[shuttlt]

Everything I've read about the practice suggests that they care very much about which gender they identify as.

This is the first time I've seen an attempt to distinguish between "gender identity" and "gender performance". I don't really see the value. In the context of what Zig and I and Earthborn are talking about, I don't even see the difference.

I don't know too much about this, so I'm up for being educated.

In these highly patriarchal communities, there were necessary social duties that could only be fulfilled by men. Families that did not have a man to fulfill these duties could put forward a woman instead - but she was then required to live as a man.

I thought transgender people's gender was on the inside in a non-detectable way, and then they either did, or did not outwardly present that. I didn't get the impression that these Albanians were "discovering" that these women had internally felt like men all along and society was acknowledging it. In our context, these would be CIS women who were agreeing for social reasons to act male. They are no more men (in the sense we are talking about), than I would be black if I covered myself in boot polish.

 

[theprestige]

I know you're being sarcastic, but they're actually a lot more interesting than people realize. I've spent my career messing around with huge datasets in everything from education demographics to radio station listener stats, and none of them have been as richly fascinating as medical record data. All the complexity of the human body and medicine combined with all the complexity of trying to quantify and classify...it's great!

Not being sarcastic at all. How things work is interesting to me. Learning the details of a business process brings me joy.

Plus, if medical records don't actually work the way I assume, I'll look even stupider if I continue to talk like they do after learning otherwise.

 

[Earthborn]

If the government is providing and regulating healthcare it sure is.

Not even then.

The birth certificate is often the original source of truth for other medical records.

Is it?

Do you really believe the purpose of the biological sex field on the form is to advise the medical staff on how to address the patient?

Yes, I so believe that. When hospital staff register a transgender person is, it's the first thing they ask and it's exactly how they ask it. "Do you want us to refer to you by your new gender?"

Do you really believe that is the path to good medical outcomes?

It is a path to potential confusion as you have pointed out, but so is the opposite.

Also, if gender is so fluid, then how can their stated gender possibly contain reliable information about how they should be addressed?

It can't. It usually still is only a binary choice.

Shouldn't medical records serve to clear the doctor's mind of irrelevancies, and help them to focus on what actually matters to the health of the patient?

Yes, they should.

 

[Earthborn]

What is and is not the gov's business is also pretty fluid.

Obviously. And what different cultures consider justifiable discrimination is also pretty fluid.

But if I were to propose that the government should put "religion" on everybody's identification papers, with a rather set of options, and no option for "none", "rather not say" or " a bit of a few", and requiring a whole lot of hassle if you want to change it -- as is true for many Islamic countries -- I think most people on this forum would agree that is kinda ridiculous.

Some Americans might think doing the same for "race" is rather mundane.

Every datapoint the government officially registers about you, exists to discriminate you, or it started out for that purpose.

Not always match with what?

Sex in medical record does not always match with sex on birth certificate. Transgender individuals are often registered as their target sex rather than their birth sex, or sex on their birth certificate. As was the case in the example the prestige gave.
It is often less of a bureaucratic hassle to change one's sex on hospital papers than it is change it on one's birth certificate. Even in jurisdictions where there latter can be done basically on demand.

 

[Belz...]

Obviously. And what different cultures consider justifiable discrimination is also pretty fluid.

But if I were to propose that the government should put "religion" on everybody's identification papers, with a rather set of options, and no option for "none", "rather not say" or " a bit of a few", and requiring a whole lot of hassle if you want to change it -- as is true for many Islamic countries -- I think most people on this forum would agree that is kinda ridiculous.

Yes, but people knowing your sex is generally not a problem. So why is it a problem here?

Every datapoint the government officially registers about you, exists to discriminate you, or it started out for that purpose.

I feel like you're using the word "discriminate" in a very self-serving way.

Sex in medical record does not always match with sex on birth certificate.

Sounds like an error to me.

Transgender individuals are often registered as their target sex rather than their birth sex, or sex on their birth certificate. As was the case in the example the prestige gave.

Aren't sex and gender different? I thought you couldn't change sex.

Again, it seems impossible to pin down definitions.

 

[d4m10n]

Without data gathering on subjects such as sex and gender and profession, it's going to be tricky to study the so-called "gender pay gap" and figure out whether it's being driven by birth sex, self-identification, or chosen field (among other possibilities).

ETA: For the sake of topicality, any word on the pay gap between non-binary people assigned male at birth and non-binary people assigned female at birth?

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[theprestige]

Without data gathering on subjects such as sex and gender and profession, it's going to be tricky to study the so-called "gender pay gap" and figure out whether it's being driven by birth sex, self-identification, or chosen field (among other possibilities).

ETA: For the sake of topicality, any word on the pay gap between non-binary people assigned male at birth and non-binary people assigned female at birth?

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One of these days the Atlantic is going to publish a story about a transman who needs to close the pay gap so they can pay off the medical bills for their transition.

 

[arthwollipot]

Well that raises an interesting point, though. A few years ago transgenderism was equated with gender dysphoria, which meant that you needed a diagnostic from a mental health professional to qualify. Nonbinary would be similar, I would think. But now there seems to be no standard at all except self-identification. But self-ID on anything has never been particularily reliable.

Transgender and nonbinary are different things. This thread is, originally I guess but subject to thread drift, about nonbinariness.

Male is not an identity...

To some people, it is. And you erasing their identity is not on.

The problem of qualia being used in this case, is that you cannot understand what it is like to be me, and yet I understand what it is like to be a bat.

I cannot understand what it is like to be you, but I can understand what it is like to be me. I am not a bat.

More to the point: it seems really hard to pin down exactly what "gender" means now. My recent attempts have been unsuccessful.

Yes, you're starting to understand.

One of these days the Atlantic is going to publish a story about a transman who needs to close the pay gap so they can pay off the medical bills for their transition.

For a start, the appropriate term is "trans man" not "transman" - some people will get remarkably upset about that, so it is something you should take into consideration. And secondly, yes, the gender pay gap is one of those things that needs serious consideration in this "new" (not really) gender paradigm. Currently, it is not at all clear.

 

[d4m10n]

For a start, the appropriate term is "trans man" not "transman" - some people will get remarkably upset about that, so it is something you should take into consideration.

Meanwhile, policemen and firemen and airmen and postmen are standing by, utterly unperturbed.

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