Can We Discuss Sex & Gender / Transgender People?

[SigmatheZeta]

@TomC You are a hardliner on the belief that universal segregation is a permanent solution.

The fact that I disagree with you is not evidence that I am a villain. It is more likely to me that you are simply wrong.

 

[Emily Lake]

I am a chimera.

Do you genuinely have chimerism? That's kind of awesome... well, okay it's awesome for me to meet a genetic chimera, not necessarily awesome for you, since it makes all sorts of things complicated.

 

[Emily Lake]

I am not trying to put blame on you, but I want to stab somebody. You just happen to be there. Sorry.

FWIW, you have my sympathy. It's a heartbreaking event for anyone to go through, regardless of the person's identity. My spouse went through a lot of the same thing about a decade ago when one of his close friends committed suicide. The same "could I have done something?", the same anger, the same sorrow. Well, maybe not exactly the same, but close enough to understand what you're going through.

 

[SigmatheZeta]

I am a chimera.

Do you genuinely have chimerism? That's kind of awesome... well, okay it's awesome for me to meet a genetic chimera, not necessarily awesome for you, since it makes all sorts of things complicated.

Not likely. However, the fact that I am transgender plus the fact that my mother's side of the family has giganticomastia plus the fact that polymorphisms in the gene that codes an important estrogen receptor makes it likely that I am literally a mutant. When I got my blood tested prior to starting HRT, my hormone balance was barely within the normal range.

 

[SigmatheZeta]

I am not trying to put blame on you, but I want to stab somebody. You just happen to be there. Sorry.

FWIW, you have my sympathy. It's a heartbreaking event for anyone to go through, regardless of the person's identity. My spouse went through a lot of the same thing about a decade ago when one of his close friends committed suicide. The same "could I have done something?", the same anger, the same sorrow. Well, maybe not exactly the same, but close enough to understand what you're going through.

Thank you. She just got released from the clinic feeling better.

 

[Emily Lake]

Furthermore, I think that purity ethics, among women, are profoundly dysfunctional. It results in a supply bottleneck. It should come as no surprise that men are rapey bastards in the same cultures where women are up on their moral high horses regarding dysfunctional purity ethics. It indicates a failure to understand basic economics.

First, what do you mean by "purity ethics"? The term has come up a few times, and I don't know what it's supposed to imply.

Second... I'm a bit put off by referring to interpersonal intimacy as "economics". It ends up sounding like you're blaming women for the existence of rapist because some women don't feel obligated to put out? I sincerely hope that's not what you're trying to say, because I would have to severely disagree with that.

 

[TomC]

@TomC You are a hardliner on the belief that universal segregation is a permanent solution.

The fact that I disagree with you is not evidence that I am a villain. It is more likely to me that you are simply wrong.

I said no such things.
Never.

Because I don't believe any of them, and I have a problem with posting things I believe are inaccurate.

I have deep inhibitions against saying anything I believe is inaccurate.

No you don't, in my experience. This post is evidence.
Tom

 

[Emily Lake]

But labels are important! Like Shakespeare says, "You call a rose something else... it ain't gonna smell like it does now."

Huh. I'm not entirely sure what you think you're supporting with that quote. But it's absolutely true that a rose (female human) by any other name (man) still smells like a rose (is a female). Changing the label of a thing doesn't actually change the thing. Calling a male human a woman doesn't actually make that male person transform into a female person. Calling a person a wizard doesn't grant them mystical powers to override the laws of physics. You could call me a chicken rump for all I care, I'm pretty sure I'm not going to sprout feathers.

 

[Emily Lake]

This seems quite contrary to reality because Trans-men and Trans-women couldn't actually exist if there wasn't an answer to "What's the difference between men and women?" The trouble becomes, some people want the answer to that question to have easily identifiable traits, when the truth is much harder to explain physiologically and behaviorally. It is a bit like quantum tunneling. The people wanting to be uber-labelers will say it isn't possible, despite the observations showing very definitively that it does. Just because we can't understand wholly doesn't negate it's reality.

We know there are trans-genders. So this desire to define them out of existence is stupid. Just because a question is hard to answer, doesn't mean it doesn't have an answer that satisfies the constraints.

First off, stop using disorders of sexual development as an argument for transgender people. They are not the same, they are not interchangeable. Let's take a brief side trip into Body Integrity Identity Disorder (BIID), where people identify as being disabled, frequently as being paraplegic or quadriplegic. Do you think it would be politically and logically appropriate to make the argument that "Some people are born without legs, therefore someone who identifies as paraplegic, despite having completely normal and functional legs, should be recognized and treated as if they were actually legless"? I think that would be an idiotic argument, as well as being rather insulting to people with actual physical disabilities. So please, for the love of all things noble and good, stop using DSDs as some "gotcha" in discussions about transgender people. They are not the same things.

Secondly, no, it's NOT that hard to define male and female. They're actually pretty fucking clear definitions, definitions which hold across every single mammalian species on the planet, as well as the vast majority of vertebrates! It is a definition based on the very really reality of reproductive biology. Males are those creatures whose systems are organized around the production of small motile gametes, regardless of whether they actually produce any gametes at all. Females are those creatures whose systems are organized around the production of large sessile gametes, regardless of whether they actually produce any gametes at all. Insisting that sex is a spectrum or really super complicated is the gender ideology version of Intelligent Design. It's dumb, it's anti-science, and it's just plain wrong. Please stop spreading misinformation.

 

[Jarhyn]

[quote removed for consistency]
You don't know what or how my transition is shaped. I have not told you because you have no right to know, and you have not asked.

You could ask the actual transgender people here whether what I am is a mockery of them? They know. I've discussed it with them.

Further, maybe you should discuss with allllllllllll the other gay folks I know, have known, continue to know since dating my husband, and divorcing my ex-wife, whether they think I'm 'gay'.

You have also assumed a lot of my sexual history.

I've been raped a few times by people with penises.

All those times the people doing it were "men". I have slept with... Well, it would take me a long time to get really comprehensive with every person with a penis I've had sex with. I've only shared a bed with two women, one of which had a penis and the other with which no sex happened. I've had sex with one person with a vagina in all my life, and he is my husband.

Perhaps you mistake "every person with a vagina I've ever been attracted to came out as a man" with something else? Is it that hard to just assume you don't actually know anything about me?

The fact is, you have defined me out of existence yet here I stand. My statement as to my identity is that it would be nice if you treated me as you would treat, say, Gandalf (or, well, perhaps Radaghast) if they were inexplicably standing before you. Even if you don't believe that thing could exist for such a treatment.

I'm not going to report you here for telling me, wholely embarrassingly inaccurately, what I am as opposed to what the contents of my words are.

Now, there was a question about prison pals...

 

[Emily Lake]

https://www.biologyonline.com/dictionary/life
Many things have definitions that don't work at the edges. The terms were created without regard for those edges, or even awareness in some cases. Lets consider another: What is life?

Bacteria--certainly.

Viruses--this can be argued either way.

Prions--I have never seen them seriously considered life, yet they are an infectious agent.

Computer viruses--again, this can be argued either way.

And, what is a unique life?

At fertilization? It can split into two or more identical twins after that point. Two (or theoretically more, but I've never heard of a case) fertilized eggs can also combine to form a chimera.

Viruses are not alive. They're essentially self-replicating machines.
Prion are not alive. They are protein strands. They're more akin to a chemical catalyst than to anything alive.
Computer viruses are not alive. I don't even know why you would think it could be argued that they are.

It's really strange that you link to a clear definition of life, which refutes your assertions with respect to viruses and computer viruses. I wonder if maybe you didn't read your own link?

 

[Emily Lake]

Smurfs makes so much more sense on in shrooms.

That's better...

 

[Emily Lake]

Tell me Emily, would you share a prison cell with an assertive but nonviolent person slight of frame with no balls, perhaps guilty of some technological crime, that would do their best to never actually look at your body even if they were forced to share a space with you, excepting odd requests such as "look at this mole"? Would you, throwing up your hands saying "alas what else can we do," throw this smallish nonviolent person with no balls in prison with a bunch of large people with balls and violent histories which include rape, and violent current tense activities that also involve rape?

With no balls? Sure. I generally say "no penis", but a penis and no balls would probably be fine.

Now, let's imagine this person identifies as a "man". Or at the very least does not identify as a woman at all.

Can you hold by this principle still? Does how they identity change how you interact socially with this person?

Edit: I fully admit I have a destination with this line. That destination is, hopefully, you understanding my position in the way I understand it. You can do with it what you want after that. I am going to be uncharacteristically kind, even, within this framework.

How I interact socially with the person I share a prison cell with? Odd line of questioning, but let's roll with it.

If that person wants to be referred to by male pronouns, I don't care, I will do what I can so long as they're decent. If that person originally had a penis and testicles, and has since had their testicles removed, it's accurate to refer to them with the word that means human male. On the other hand, if that person never had testicles but instead had a vagina and uterus, then it's polite fiction. It really doesn't matter.

Beyond that... I don't know what you're looking for by "interact with socially". I don't socially make a distinction between males and females when I choose to interact with them. As a female, I am significantly more wary of unknown males than of unknown females if I am in a position of increased vulnerability. In that situation, however, I don't know what a person identifies as, nor if they have balls. I can only make an assessment based on how they appear.

But this started as a question about PRISON, where the vast majority of prisoners don't get choices about where they are placed. If a person has no balls and wants to be in with the females, and doesn't represent an undue risk to those female humans, I don't care. If that person has a penis and testicles, I don't think they should be ENTITLED to being placed with female humans, regardless of how they identify. I am, however, content to allow case-by-case exceptions provided there's compelling reason.

 

[Emily Lake]

You aren't asking anything, you are demanding that male and female labels remain rigid, when in reality, they aren't as rigid or as convenient as we'd prefer.

Male and female are pretty concrete concepts.

 

[Emily Lake]

Same here. A person wearing a dress, beardless chin, and feminine comportment is a woman. Might be 6'3", with linebacker shoulders and bulging biceps and a tight waist, but if all you need to do is use female pronouns what's hard about that? I agree, there's a handful of situations where sex matters, like public restrooms and prisons. But those are the exception, not the norm.

Hell, if they have a full on lumberjack beard and walk like a gorilla, but they want to be called a woman in all but those situations where sex matters, I'm perfectly fine with that. Anybody who wants to wear a dress should feel free to do so.

 

[Emily Lake]

I am neurodivergent, myself. I have deep inhibitions against saying anything I believe is inaccurate. However, words can have multiple definitions. For example, "woman" can be a foreshortening of "trans-woman," or it can be a foreshortening of "cis-woman." Either way, "woman" is an accurate term.

I assume that the foreshortening is context dependent? I would guess that if someone were talking about endometriosis and used the term "woman", there wouldn't be any confusion about whether or not transwomen were included. Similarly, I would suspect that you don't feel compelled to refer to "ciswomen and transmen" in that context, and could roll with the contextually appropriate "women" as the common term for a human female?

 

[Emily Lake]

Then there's your walls of text. You might just see this as explanations of why you're right, but it sure looks like mansplaining to some of us.

WoTs don't imply mansplaining. Otherwise, I think I'd be labeled a man.

 

[Emily Lake]

I am a chimera.

Do you genuinely have chimerism? That's kind of awesome... well, okay it's awesome for me to meet a genetic chimera, not necessarily awesome for you, since it makes all sorts of things complicated.

Not likely. However, the fact that I am transgender plus the fact that my mother's side of the family has giganticomastia plus the fact that polymorphisms in the gene that codes an important estrogen receptor makes it likely that I am literally a mutant. When I got my blood tested prior to starting HRT, my hormone balance was barely within the normal range.

Euphemistically a chimera, reference to the mythical critter. I only asked because I was recently having a discussion about chimerism with an evolutionary biologist, so I thought it would be a really interesting coinkidink to meet one!

There are all kinds of weird bits and bobs in genetics. I think, to some degree, all of us are mutants... but for most of us the mutations aren't deleterious. For example, I literally have no toenails on my baby toes. I just have a kind of skin fold, but they've never grown a nail of any sort. It runs in my family. Doesn't cause any problems, aside from an aversion to pedicures and open-toed shoes.

 

[Emily Lake]

I am not trying to put blame on you, but I want to stab somebody. You just happen to be there. Sorry.

FWIW, you have my sympathy. It's a heartbreaking event for anyone to go through, regardless of the person's identity. My spouse went through a lot of the same thing about a decade ago when one of his close friends committed suicide. The same "could I have done something?", the same anger, the same sorrow. Well, maybe not exactly the same, but close enough to understand what you're going through.

Thank you. She just got released from the clinic feeling better.

Good, I hope she gets the support she needs to whether the storm.

 

[Trausti]

You aren't asking anything, you are demanding that male and female labels remain rigid, when in reality, they aren't as rigid or as convenient as we'd prefer.

Male and female are pretty concrete concepts.

It’s curious that humans had no difficulty distinguishing men and women up to our present time. Now there are folks who display a cognitive deficit in simple pattern recognition. Is it something in the water? The soy?