Non-binary identities are valid

[Emily's Cat]

No sense of being female sits right with me. However, when I think about how I feel as a male, that sits right. It's not something that can be quantified.

What do you consider a "sense of being female"? Can you describe what criteria of "female" you're using in your assessment?

 

[LondonJohn]

Saying the DSM-V legitimizes anyone’s gender identity is like saying it legitimizes voices in people’s heads.

The DSM doesn’t exist to legitimize anything. It exists to categorize mental health conditions that cause people distress in order to facilitate treatment.

So... how was it decided at some point (not so very long ago) that homosexuality was not the disorder that science, medicine and law had viewed it as, but that it was actually a valid human condition?

And from where did medics, governments, judiciaries and human rights agencies derive the authority to view homosexuality in this new light (and thereby to afford it proper levels of rights legislation and other recognitions and protections)?

 

[Emily's Cat]

You are incorrect.

In the academic sense, as proposed by feminists back in the 60s, gender is the comprehensive set of socially expected behaviors, presentations, and roles associated with a sex. That usage was coined in order to draw the distinction between the physical realities of one's sexed bodies and the social interactions based on the assumption of sex. It helps to distinguish realities like "females generally have a uterus and bleed from it once a month" from constructs like "girls should be seen but not heard, and are gentle caring creatures who are always nice and smiling". One of those is a state of being that is inherent and largely unalterable*. The other is externally imposed strictures that confine and limit the agency of each sex.

Colloquially, sex and gender are the same thing, and the term gender was commonly used to disambiguate physical sex from the act of sexual intercourse.

Within this discussion, things get muddy. There's a lot of highly inconsistent usages of "gender" throughout discussions of gender identity, and there's often a fair bit of bait-and-switch involved.

 

[HansMustermann]

How are you defining "wrong" in this context? Does that same definition of "wrong" extend to other scenarios unrelated to gender?

TBH, what worries me isn't defining what's "wrong", but that it's just repeating the same assumption: your not doing what I demand that you do, actually means you forcing me to do stuff. As opposed to what any sane person would see it as in any other context: me trying to force you.

Regardless of how one defines X being right or wrong, when I'm the one demanding that you do X, then that's that: I'm the one trying to force anything. Your refusal doesn't mean you're forcing me to do anything.

It could be as objectively right as eating 5 fruit a day. If were trying to force you to eat 5 fruits a day, than it's just that: I'm the one trying to force someone to do anything. If you refuse, it doesn't mean you're the one forcing me.

The whole notion that someone refusing one's demands is the one forcing anything or verily persecuting anyone, strikes me as literally on par with the religious twits thinking they're persecuted if I don't let them tell me what to do.

 

[Emily's Cat]

It's nothing, then?

See, that's the issue. I'd wager that most people don't feel "like" either a man or a woman. They simply have no dysphoria about their bodies. Those who do, can resolve the problem via transition, which I think the government should at least partially pay for. But either way, you can't say "but I feel like X" because it's meaningless. "Man" and "woman" were never defined as something you felt like.

I can describe the experience of being a woman, which certainly includes a lot of feelings

The problem is that all of my descriptors of what it's like to be a woman are inextricably tied to either:
a) my physical sex as a female or
b) the way other people and society treat me as a result of my physical sex as a female.

 

[Emily's Cat]

99.7% of the population are not asked to use the "cis-"prefix in 99.7% of the situations. Only in situations where they might be assumed to be trans and they want to make clear they are not, is it meaningful to use it.

I have skepticism on this. I have never been in a situation where I might be assumed to be trans and felt the need to make it clear I am not. I have never once been mistaken for being trans, nor can I imagine a situation in which that might occur.

On the other hand, I've been in many situations where trans people or their allies felt a need to apply "cis" to me. And I've been in many situations and discussions where I am forced to use "cis" to disambiguate because the term "woman" has been appropriated and now includes a subset of men.

Basically, I end up either having "cis" foisted on me, or I end up having to use it because if i don't I might offend the feelings of a person who is not female.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Ironically, we have a microcosm of this question right here on this forum. If someone here states preferred pronouns, and someone else defaults to "they" instead, is that indeed perfectly fine? Or is it a breach of the MA?

Also case where not everyone's request for pronouns gets acknowledged or honored by TPTB.

 

[Emily's Cat]

That's one way of putting it, yes.

More like one side is saying either "I have five fingers" or "I have four fingers and a thumb"... and another side is claiming that their foot has five fingers.

 

[HansMustermann]

Saying the DSM-V legitimizes anyone’s gender identity is like saying it legitimizes voices in people’s heads.

The DSM doesn’t exist to legitimize anything. It exists to categorize mental health conditions that cause people distress in order to facilitate treatment.

So... how was it decided at some point (not so very long ago) that homosexuality was not the disorder that science, medicine and law had viewed it as, but that it was actually a valid human condition?

Wait... wait... this is so stupid, it's downright cute... Do you actually think it was the DSM that ended that? Really? Do you even know ANYTHING about the history of LGBT de-criminalization and eventually rights in the UK and other countries?

Do you even understand that the DSM in effect at the time when the Wolfenden Committee proposed de-criminalizing it was the DSM-1 of 1952? You know, when the APA filed male homosexuality under sociopathic personality disturbance? (The term for disorder back then.)

You actually think it was DSM reclassifying it it was the driving force behind public and government acceptance, instead of the other way around? REALLY?

You know you too can google instead of just making up BS on the spot, right?

 

[Emily's Cat]

My "correct" pronouns are the ones that I have asked you to use. I literally can't be wrong about that, any more than I can be wrong about what my name is.

You can express your preference, but there's more to it than that. At some point, there's got to be a consideration of whether your request is reasonable and rational.

You might decide you want to go by a different name. Let's say the name on your birth certificate is "John Smith". At some point, you decide that you want to go by a different name, and you ask other people to start calling you "Dwayne Johnson". It's a matter of courtesy that your friends might refer to you by your preferred name. If your family thinks you're genuinely earnest about it, they're likely to go along.

But it might get a bit more complicated when you create several profiles on various social media calling yourself "Dwayne Johnson", and you start talking about your experience of being "The Rock".

At some point, we do have to consider whether courtesy overrides reality, and at what point the request becomes unreasonable.

I'm of the opinion that it becomes unreasonable when we are obligated and forced to honor that request on threat of penalty. I'm also of the opinion that it becomes unreasonable when failure to honor someone's request results in a person being labeled a bigot, or cast as being a hate crime.

 

[xjx388]

So... how was it decided at some point (not so very long ago) that homosexuality was not the disorder that science, medicine and law had viewed it as, but that it was actually a valid human condition?

And from where did medics, governments, judiciaries and human rights agencies derive the authority to view homosexuality in this new light (and thereby to afford it proper levels of rights legislation and other recognitions and protections)?

Complex question.

I would say that the view of science changed when the realization came that homosexuality, as a condition, was not treatable. There is no surgery, therapy or other intervention that will “fix” homosexuality any more than there is to “fix” heterosexuality.

Further, there was a realization that homosexuality, in and of itself, was not a source of distress for an individual and it caused no harm to anyone else. The source of distress was familial and societal reaction to the individual who happened to be homosexual, which -other than treating the resultant depression and anxiety- was outside the purview of mental health. What was (and still is to a large extent) necessary for homosexuals to live happier and more fulfilling lives is for society to just leave them the hell alone and stop discriminating against them, not some internal mental health issue that the individual needs to address.

The same cannot be said for gender dysphoria. Beyond the societal factors, there is a disconnect between body and mind that causes distress. Addressing only the societal factors would not be effective in treating, say a person born male who has a great deal of suffering because they know they were born in the wrong body. We could leave that person alone and let them live their lives but they would still not be happy and fulfilled; they need an individual treatment to have a hope at alleviating the condition.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Actually there's one more thing I'm saying: that my personal biological situation - by which we both mean what kind of genitals I possess - are nobody else's business so why do you keep on bring it up.

Seriously. Why do people care what genitals someone possesses? Once again, unless you are engaging in a sexual relationship with someone, it's none of your business. Use the pronouns. Use the name. Anything else is superfluous, irrelevant and potentially offensive.

When the pronouns being asked for are the foot in the door that grant a penis-bearer access to a women's space, where women are naked or vulnerable... It matters. When the pronouns being asked for entitle a testicle-owner to be placed in shared cells with incarcerated women... It matters. When the pronouns that we are obligated to use result in ejaculators dominating women in athletics... It matters.

When the pronouns that are being forced upon us under the guise of "courtesy" enable women to be degraded as menstruators, bleeders, birthing parents, gestators, and cervix-havers... reducing us to our biology and denying us our humanity... It matters.

 

[gnome]

When the pronouns being asked for are the foot in the door that grant a penis-bearer access to a women's space, where women are naked or vulnerable... It matters. When the pronouns being asked for entitle a testicle-owner to be placed in shared cells with incarcerated women... It matters. When the pronouns that we are obligated to use result in ejaculators dominating women in athletics... It matters.

When the pronouns that are being forced upon us under the guise of "courtesy" enable women to be degraded as menstruators, bleeders, birthing parents, gestators, and cervix-havers... reducing us to our biology and denying us our humanity... It matters.

It is possible to adopt someone's preferred pronouns without agreeing to or supporting any of the rest of this. I don't buy the "Foot in the door" argument--it can be a separate result for each of these issues.

I am reminded of arguments that accepting marriage equality is a foot in the door for bestiality, pedophilia, and so forth.

 

[Emily's Cat]

The only problem is that the biological protocol that dictates that you're necessarily either man or woman isn't "former". And it's not as easy to discard as a mere social convention.

Also, the fact that women fighting for their right to be recognized as full humans in their own right with the same agency as other humans *still* hasn't been realized.

 

[Emily's Cat]

There's zero "discussion" to be had around this point: the gender identity pf a person is 100% to do with (and is solely to do with) the consideration of that person. It's in no way whatsoever defined with reference to the way in which others perceive the presentation of that person.

And yet... that 100% inside their own head and based on their own feelings gender identity is used to impose an obligation on other people. And it frequently results in females being disenfranchised or put at increased risk.

The reality is that one person's internal perception of their own feelings is placed at a higher priority than the actual real agency of an already disadvantaged segment of people.

 

[Emily's Cat]

See: to me, your language here appears to imply one of, or any combination of, a) these people somehow have a choice in their gender identity, and/or b) if someone's gender identity is what they themselves say it is, how can "we" treat this as valid when we cannot test their "claim" against objective yardsticks, and/or c) some (or maybe all??) of these people ought to be treated either as mentally ill people or as liars.

Or d) that some people who are not in any way dysphoric can *claim to be trans or non-binary* in order to gain access to situations they would otherwise be rightfully excluded from, either for person gain or for nefarious purposes.

Given that the entirety of gender identity is inside a person's head, and that there is exactly zero ways to validate their claim... It presents a massive gaping loophole open to abuse.

 

[theprestige]

My "correct" pronouns are the ones that I have asked you to use. I literally can't be wrong about that, any more than I can be wrong about what my name is.

You might be interested in Darat's final paragraph here:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=13415453#post13415453

 

[Emily's Cat]

So, we're back to just browbeating?

Also, considering that I actually have an experience with being trans-gender and gender fluid -- and as early as the early 80's, no less, so I didn't get hordes of people falling over themselves to accommodate it -- remind me, what are YOUR qualifications to be lecturing me about how it works or what my belief system should be? I mean, seriously, if I'm ignorant and you're the one qualified to lecture, what ARE your qualifications there?

Appeal to sophisticated theology, I believe the term was?

 

[Emily's Cat]

Yes. Indeed, non-binary gender identity does not require visual presentation of any particular kind whatsoever (with the same also being true of binary transgender identity, of course).

Alrighty then.

Does a person's declaration of non-binariness entitle them to use both male and female changing rooms, on their whim? Does it entitle them to demand both a pap smear and a prostate screening? Can they hold both the male and the female position in a district in NY?

 

[Emily's Cat]

T
So let's start helping them to support it, rather than pulling supports away.

I don't know what this means in the context that you're responding to.