Can a man get pregnant

[John Dule]

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

Pronouns also reference biological sex rather than gender, since throughout history they were automatically applied to a baby upon its birth.

Yet we recognized above that this usage has changed since whatever your definition of "throughout history" entails (which is itself misleading, since there have been many instances of historically-recognized gender non-conforming people being known by other pronouns than those they were assigned at birth and by the name given by their culture to gender non-conforming people), although your response to it was the very wishy-washy "definitions do change but I'm still going to be hostile to this particular instance of it Because Ideology".

So you have the right to alter the definitions but we don't have the right to question those changes?

[If my soul was made of stone]

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

Pronouns also reference biological sex rather than gender, since throughout history they were automatically applied to a baby upon its birth.

Yet we recognized above that this usage has changed since whatever your definition of "throughout history" entails (which is itself misleading, since there have been many instances of historically-recognized gender non-conforming people being known by other pronouns than those they were assigned at birth and by the name given by their culture to gender non-conforming people), although your response to it was the very wishy-washy "definitions do change but I'm still going to be hostile to this particular instance of it Because Ideology".

So you have the right to alter the definitions but we don't have the right to question those changes?

You have every right to question it; I just don't think you were doing so in good faith.

[John Dule]

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

Pronouns also reference biological sex rather than gender, since throughout history they were automatically applied to a baby upon its birth.

Yet we recognized above that this usage has changed since whatever your definition of "throughout history" entails (which is itself misleading, since there have been many instances of historically-recognized gender non-conforming people being known by other pronouns than those they were assigned at birth and by the name given by their culture to gender non-conforming people), although your response to it was the very wishy-washy "definitions do change but I'm still going to be hostile to this particular instance of it Because Ideology".

So you have the right to alter the definitions but we don't have the right to question those changes?

You have every right to question it; I just don't think you were doing so in good faith.

Oh ok. Why is that? I would instinctively question any redefinition of any word. The burden is on those advocating a change to the status quo to demonstrate why the change is necessary.

[Klobmentum Mutilated Herself]

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

Pronouns also reference biological sex rather than gender, since throughout history they were automatically applied to a baby upon its birth.

Yet we recognized above that this usage has changed since whatever your definition of "throughout history" entails (which is itself misleading, since there have been many instances of historically-recognized gender non-conforming people being known by other pronouns than those they were assigned at birth and by the name given by their culture to gender non-conforming people), although your response to it was the very wishy-washy "definitions do change but I'm still going to be hostile to this particular instance of it Because Ideology".

So you have the right to alter the definitions but we don't have the right to question those changes?

You have every right to question it; I just don't think you were doing so in good faith.

Oh ok. Why is that? I would instinctively question any redefinition of any word. The burden is on those advocating a change to the status quo to demonstrate why the change is necessary.

Are the millions of transgender people too burdensome to explain the necessity of a change?

The reason why your arguments — top say nothing of the posters preceding you who take more explicit pride in their bigotry — can't be taken in good faith is because it's been explained over and over again why it's important to change the status quo (or rather, acknowledge that the status quo had been to ignore a demographic of people who have existed ever since the social construction of gender), and you still pretend that nobody has ever presented a valid argument. It's been explained. You just don't want to listen.

[fhtagn]

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

Pronouns also reference biological sex rather than gender, since throughout history they were automatically applied to a baby upon its birth.

Yet we recognized above that this usage has changed since whatever your definition of "throughout history" entails (which is itself misleading, since there have been many instances of historically-recognized gender non-conforming people being known by other pronouns than those they were assigned at birth and by the name given by their culture to gender non-conforming people), although your response to it was the very wishy-washy "definitions do change but I'm still going to be hostile to this particular instance of it Because Ideology".

So you have the right to alter the definitions but we don't have the right to question those changes?

You have every right to question it; I just don't think you were doing so in good faith.

Oh ok. Why is that? I would instinctively question any redefinition of any word. The burden is on those advocating a change to the status quo to demonstrate why the change is necessary.

Are the millions of transgender people too burdensome to explain the necessity of a change?

The reason why your arguments — top say nothing of the posters preceding you who take more explicit pride in their bigotry — can't be taken in good faith is because it's been explained over and over again why it's important to change the status quo (or rather, acknowledge that the status quo had been to ignore a demographic of people who have existed ever since the social construction of gender), and you still pretend that nobody has ever presented a valid argument. It's been explained. You just don't want to listen.

If we are being honest, it's a fairly negligible % of the population to demand a complete change in our language and how words are defined.

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

I don't care what trans people do with their bodies or what pronouns they use.  I call them by whatever they want to be called.  If they feel like they're a man, good for them.  I'll treat them as a man.  Ultimately though, it doesn't change the fact that men can't get pregnant, only women can.  Its sad that some people are born into what they feel are the wrong bodies, I sympathize with them.

You care enough to draw a hard line on who gets to be a man. A hard line that ignores the distinction between gender and sex, and completely ignores intersex people or post-op trans people.

You say you sympathize with them, but you'll say that they're not a man if they do X (in this case, become pregnant, but following the same logic, cis people can, will, and do pick whatever activity of descriptor as being something that means a trans person cannot be the gender they say they are.

I just want all the No voters to admit that they don't think trans people are the gender they say they are. Many will and have done this happily, but many of those voters would consider themselves supportive or at least sympathetic to trans people. The burden is on the latter group to explain how denying that trans people are the gender they say they are does not make them a textbook transphobe.

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

This is a laughably bad faith take.

[If my soul was made of stone]

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

Pronouns also reference biological sex rather than gender, since throughout history they were automatically applied to a baby upon its birth.

Yet we recognized above that this usage has changed since whatever your definition of "throughout history" entails (which is itself misleading, since there have been many instances of historically-recognized gender non-conforming people being known by other pronouns than those they were assigned at birth and by the name given by their culture to gender non-conforming people), although your response to it was the very wishy-washy "definitions do change but I'm still going to be hostile to this particular instance of it Because Ideology".

So you have the right to alter the definitions but we don't have the right to question those changes?

You have every right to question it; I just don't think you were doing so in good faith.

Oh ok. Why is that? I would instinctively question any redefinition of any word. The burden is on those advocating a change to the status quo to demonstrate why the change is necessary.

I could just as well argue that the burden of proof is on you, since countless societies throughout history have recognized some understanding of gender non-conformity and you're advocating for the replacement of that with a totalizing understanding of deterministic biological essentialism, but that would be puerile sophistry. Either way, it's clear that the case for as much should be made to you for the sake of your own understanding.

Interdependent though they are, our cognition and our perceptions of ourselves are not strictly determined by our bodies. We have an ability as intelligent beings to perceive and make judgments about our bodies, to listen or not listen to what our bodies tell us, to understand our bodies in relation to those of others. We are also capable of identifying with characteristics of the body or other ideas that are not our own; if one prefers a slimmer form to that of their current size, BMI, et cetera, then they are capable of taking actions to actualize that form. My experience of gender dysphoria is my cognition's way of telling me that it sees other bodies as a greater fit for itself than my own, which in turn becomes an embodied experience of pain relative to certain characteristics that I consider undesirable (the length of my limbs, the breadth of my shoulders, and so on). Thus I have a conception of what physicality I identify with that exists separately from the physicality that I am granted by my birth sex and sundry genetic characteristics. I also happen to identify with various embodied processes of the feminine form that I am not privy to: giving birth, breastfeeding, menstruating, etc. Unfortunately, the limits of current scientific advancement preclude much of this from being realized, but I still experience those ideas as personal ideals and phenomena of body (feeling a hole in my abdomen where I feel a uterus ought to be).

From this experience I have constructed an identity around these signifiers rather than those that I was born into, and thus I am taking certain actions, such as changing my manner of dress, hormone replacement therapy, and hopefully certain surgeries in the future, to adapt my form and presentation to that which I know as a personal ideal and that which my body tells me that it should inhabit. The medical profession by and large accepts this as better treatment for the distress caused by incongruity of sex and conception of self (or "gender identity" if you will) than any of the means typically used to repress this division, and contrary to your insistence the ethically-questionable Foucaults and Moneys (no one even talks about the latter unless they're pushing an agenda) of the world aren't the only ones who have noted this.

It would appear from the records of classical antiquity and the various pre-colonial societies of Siberia, the Philippines, Latin America, and so on, that humans have understood gender identity as separate from birth sex for perhaps longer than humans have kept history; examples can be found around the world of societies that recognize a social role for those who adopt the mannerisms of the other sex or of some liminal space between the two, at times within a religious context (some folks, including our own trans-adjacent pal Nathan, argue that gender dysphoria is best understood as a spiritual experience, although surely this won't appeal to you). Even setting aside gender non-conformity, gender roles have varied and evolved in various societies throughout history, some societies adopting characteristics in one gender that others see more in another, to the point that we can reject any idea of gender being solely informed by innate qualities of sex rather than subjective societal ideas.

Thus one might turn the premise on its head and ask, as I hinted at above: why has Western Civilization™ seen fit to reject these understandings in favor of the idea that there is no difference between sex and gender? Why don't you have to prove that the muxe or the babaylan are invalid ways of understanding oneself in relation to one's body or the ideas that emerge from bodies and that we instead must conform strictly to what we were born with? Why don't you have to prove that when I feel the sensation of compression squeezing hips inwards that beg to be those of a woman it's best merely to live with that deeply harrowing sensation rather than take a medication that my doctor at a world-renowned hospital has prescribed me with the aim of alleviating that phenomenon and making my form resemble what it tells me that it ought to be?

Ultimately, I can only speak from my personal experience and my own understandings of these ideas far greater than the scope of one person's understanding. I hope that I have done justice to these experiences and the great weight of questions that our species has pondered for as long as we have known thought.

[fhtagn]

I don't care what trans people do with their bodies or what pronouns they use.  I call them by whatever they want to be called.  If they feel like they're a man, good for them.  I'll treat them as a man.  Ultimately though, it doesn't change the fact that men can't get pregnant, only women can.  Its sad that some people are born into what they feel are the wrong bodies, I sympathize with them.

You care enough to draw a hard line on who gets to be a man. A hard line that ignores the distinction between gender and sex, and completely ignores intersex people or post-op trans people.

You say you sympathize with them, but you'll say that they're not a man if they do X (in this case, become pregnant, but following the same logic, cis people can, will, and do pick whatever activity of descriptor as being something that means a trans person cannot be the gender they say they are.

I just want all the No voters to admit that they don't think trans people are the gender they say they are. Many will and have done this happily, but many of those voters would consider themselves supportive or at least sympathetic to trans people. The burden is on the latter group to explain how denying that trans people are the gender they say they are does not make them a textbook transphobe.

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

This is a laughably bad faith take.

you just don't like what's being said.

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

I don't care what trans people do with their bodies or what pronouns they use.  I call them by whatever they want to be called.  If they feel like they're a man, good for them.  I'll treat them as a man.  Ultimately though, it doesn't change the fact that men can't get pregnant, only women can.  Its sad that some people are born into what they feel are the wrong bodies, I sympathize with them.

You care enough to draw a hard line on who gets to be a man. A hard line that ignores the distinction between gender and sex, and completely ignores intersex people or post-op trans people.

You say you sympathize with them, but you'll say that they're not a man if they do X (in this case, become pregnant, but following the same logic, cis people can, will, and do pick whatever activity of descriptor as being something that means a trans person cannot be the gender they say they are.

I just want all the No voters to admit that they don't think trans people are the gender they say they are. Many will and have done this happily, but many of those voters would consider themselves supportive or at least sympathetic to trans people. The burden is on the latter group to explain how denying that trans people are the gender they say they are does not make them a textbook transphobe.

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

This is a laughably bad faith take.

you just don't like what's being said.

Pretty much all pro trans people see the sex label as effectively a gender marker for all practical purposes and/or think that birth sex shouldn't be on id(at least without also having gender marked as a superannuation category.

[President of the great nation of 🏳️‍⚧️]

Are the millions of transgender people too burdensome to explain the necessity of a change?

Yes. Honestly, I need to learn to stop giving a sh**t that nobody will ever see me as a woman, because I'm sure as hell not going to change anyone's minds, or pass well enough to conceal my transness. Dreadnought quotes can only get me so far in life, and even so, how am I going to explain why I'm so hyperfixated on a book series with a trans protagonist in the case of the latter? Anyway, since this is the political debate board and my moping about my personal life doesn't count as debate:

Pretty much all pro trans people see the sex label as effectively a gender marker for all practical purposes and/or think that birth sex shouldn't be on id(at least without also having gender marked as a superannuation category.

Whatever, lady, my feelings don't care about facts.

[fhtagn]

I don't care what trans people do with their bodies or what pronouns they use.  I call them by whatever they want to be called.  If they feel like they're a man, good for them.  I'll treat them as a man.  Ultimately though, it doesn't change the fact that men can't get pregnant, only women can.  Its sad that some people are born into what they feel are the wrong bodies, I sympathize with them.

You care enough to draw a hard line on who gets to be a man. A hard line that ignores the distinction between gender and sex, and completely ignores intersex people or post-op trans people.

You say you sympathize with them, but you'll say that they're not a man if they do X (in this case, become pregnant, but following the same logic, cis people can, will, and do pick whatever activity of descriptor as being something that means a trans person cannot be the gender they say they are.

I just want all the No voters to admit that they don't think trans people are the gender they say they are. Many will and have done this happily, but many of those voters would consider themselves supportive or at least sympathetic to trans people. The burden is on the latter group to explain how denying that trans people are the gender they say they are does not make them a textbook transphobe.

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

This is a laughably bad faith take.

you just don't like what's being said.

Pretty much all pro trans people see the sex label as effectively a gender marker for all practical purposes and/or think that birth sex shouldn't be on id(at least without also having gender marked as a superannuation category.

You're only proving my point that the trans movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time.

Why shouldn't your sex be listed on your birth certificates and IDs? For the purpose of birth certificates especially, no amount of living your life as something else changes the fact that we are born male or female. It's not something someone just assigned to us, it's our state of existence as humans.

[Klobmentum Mutilated Herself]

I don't care what trans people do with their bodies or what pronouns they use.  I call them by whatever they want to be called.  If they feel like they're a man, good for them.  I'll treat them as a man.  Ultimately though, it doesn't change the fact that men can't get pregnant, only women can.  Its sad that some people are born into what they feel are the wrong bodies, I sympathize with them.

You care enough to draw a hard line on who gets to be a man. A hard line that ignores the distinction between gender and sex, and completely ignores intersex people or post-op trans people.

You say you sympathize with them, but you'll say that they're not a man if they do X (in this case, become pregnant, but following the same logic, cis people can, will, and do pick whatever activity of descriptor as being something that means a trans person cannot be the gender they say they are.

I just want all the No voters to admit that they don't think trans people are the gender they say they are. Many will and have done this happily, but many of those voters would consider themselves supportive or at least sympathetic to trans people. The burden is on the latter group to explain how denying that trans people are the gender they say they are does not make them a textbook transphobe.

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

This is a laughably bad faith take.

you just don't like what's being said.

Pretty much all pro trans people see the sex label as effectively a gender marker for all practical purposes and/or think that birth sex shouldn't be on id(at least without also having gender marked as a superannuation category.

You're only proving my point that the trans movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time.

Why shouldn't your sex be listed on your birth certificates and IDs? For the purpose of birth certificates especially, no amount of living your life as something else changes the fact that we are born male or female. It's not something someone just assigned to us, it's our state of existence as humans.

Why does it matter that birth certificates be gendered at all? Or passports, IDs, or anything else that bigots are upset about becoming gender neutral. You can change your name on a birth certificate or an ID, so why shouldn't someone be able to change their sex marker? That is assuming the sex marker's presence on the certificate is necessary, which it isn't.

Allowing these documents to be changed are actually the simplest thing to do. If someone has transitioned, legally changed their name and is legally recognized as the gender they were not assigned at birth, then it actually causes more confusion for them to have numerous documents identifying them as a separate person than they are currently, legally identified as. Is not the purpose of identification to verify the identity of a person?

[TheReckoning]

No one is “objectively” not black from a definition that is not inherently arbitrary.

Just because you're ignorant of the debate between how to categorize racial categories does not mean the debate does not exist with similar contention to the debate over gender definitions.

Ask any mixed raced person, especially someone who is 1/4 or less black if their blackness is universally accepted as valid, in the black community or out of it. There is debate on whether Africans Descended from Slaves and African immigrants belong in the same category. Then there's Afro-Latinx immigrants who emigrated from Latin American countries but whose ancestors in those countries were slaves stolen from Afrifa; many of them identify strictly as Hispanic and not black, and many of those who identify as black are told by non-Latinx black Americans that they're more Hispanic than black. Then there's Africans in Africa, many of whom feel solidarity with black Americans and consider them to be one people, then there's Africans who feel they're completely separate from black Americans and that the concept of race and blackness is not as important to their identity as it is for black Americans.

So, most of the time when we talk about black people, most of us agree on who we're talking about. Nevertheless, there is contention, especially when you try to pin down a specific definitive definition. That's the same thing with trying to pin down a specific definition for women or men.

You’re just proving my point that black has no definition beyond how people want to define it because people define it based on totally arbritary things. If gender is the same, then there’s nothing wrong with saying, “there’s only two genders, and they’re based in biological sex.”

[Klobmentum Mutilated Herself]

No one is “objectively” not black from a definition that is not inherently arbitrary.

Just because you're ignorant of the debate between how to categorize racial categories does not mean the debate does not exist with similar contention to the debate over gender definitions.

Ask any mixed raced person, especially someone who is 1/4 or less black if their blackness is universally accepted as valid, in the black community or out of it. There is debate on whether Africans Descended from Slaves and African immigrants belong in the same category. Then there's Afro-Latinx immigrants who emigrated from Latin American countries but whose ancestors in those countries were slaves stolen from Afrifa; many of them identify strictly as Hispanic and not black, and many of those who identify as black are told by non-Latinx black Americans that they're more Hispanic than black. Then there's Africans in Africa, many of whom feel solidarity with black Americans and consider them to be one people, then there's Africans who feel they're completely separate from black Americans and that the concept of race and blackness is not as important to their identity as it is for black Americans.

So, most of the time when we talk about black people, most of us agree on who we're talking about. Nevertheless, there is contention, especially when you try to pin down a specific definitive definition. That's the same thing with trying to pin down a specific definition for women or men.

You’re just proving my point that black has no definition beyond how people want to define it because people define it based on totally arbritary things. If gender is the same, then there’s nothing wrong with saying, “there’s only two genders, and they’re based in biological sex.”

Again, not my point. My point is, while looking to pin down a specific definition is going to involve semantic debate, we all agree that black people exist, just as we agree that men and women exist (I'm going to assume you don't believe nonbinary people exist, though I'd be happy to he proven wrong, so I'll leave them out of this for now, no pun intended). To exclude people who are clearly black who identify as black from being black based on whatever semantic loophole — perhaps they're an African or a Latin American immigrant, perhaps they're multiracial with whute-passing parents — defeats the purpose of racial categorization in general. To exclude someone who is clearly a man who identifies as a man — and let's add that this theoretical man has a penis and is legally recognized as man — from being a man because he wasn't born with a penis, and perhaps he gave birth before medically transitioning (but after socially transitioning), defeats the purpose of gender labels. If that's not a man, then what is he?

[Mr. Reactionary]

If that's not a man, then what is he?

He's a transman.

[Klobmentum Mutilated Herself]

If that's not a man, then what is he?

He's a transman.

Yes or no: Is a trans man a man?

If a "transman" (don't think your lack of a space went unnoticed) is not a man in your view, but he is still a "transman" rather than a woman, then you acknowledge that gender is not the same as the genitals a person is born with, correct?

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

I don't care what trans people do with their bodies or what pronouns they use.  I call them by whatever they want to be called.  If they feel like they're a man, good for them.  I'll treat them as a man.  Ultimately though, it doesn't change the fact that men can't get pregnant, only women can.  Its sad that some people are born into what they feel are the wrong bodies, I sympathize with them.

You care enough to draw a hard line on who gets to be a man. A hard line that ignores the distinction between gender and sex, and completely ignores intersex people or post-op trans people.

You say you sympathize with them, but you'll say that they're not a man if they do X (in this case, become pregnant, but following the same logic, cis people can, will, and do pick whatever activity of descriptor as being something that means a trans person cannot be the gender they say they are.

I just want all the No voters to admit that they don't think trans people are the gender they say they are. Many will and have done this happily, but many of those voters would consider themselves supportive or at least sympathetic to trans people. The burden is on the latter group to explain how denying that trans people are the gender they say they are does not make them a textbook transphobe.

The transgender movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time. Funny how we don't see you criticizing when they do it.

For example: birth certificates list sex, not gender. But many of them insist on changing their birth certificate to reflect something they were not born as.

This is a laughably bad faith take.

you just don't like what's being said.

Pretty much all pro trans people see the sex label as effectively a gender marker for all practical purposes and/or think that birth sex shouldn't be on id(at least without also having gender marked as a superannuation category.

You're only proving my point that the trans movement ignores the distinction between gender and sex all the time.

Why shouldn't your sex be listed on your birth certificates and IDs? For the purpose of birth certificates especially, no amount of living your life as something else changes the fact that we are born male or female. It's not something someone just assigned to us, it's our state of existence as humans.

Birth sex is not fundamental to who we are in any way relevant to identification in a way gender is not. The reverse is not true. Gender tells says plenty about us that sex doesn't. Ones mind is generally more important to who one is than ones body.

And thinking that birth sex shouldn't be on identification and gender should is not " ignor[ing] the distinction between gender and sex". This should be obvious.

I'd type more, but I'm already on my break too long.

[TheReckoning]

No one is “objectively” not black from a definition that is not inherently arbitrary.

Just because you're ignorant of the debate between how to categorize racial categories does not mean the debate does not exist with similar contention to the debate over gender definitions.

Ask any mixed raced person, especially someone who is 1/4 or less black if their blackness is universally accepted as valid, in the black community or out of it. There is debate on whether Africans Descended from Slaves and African immigrants belong in the same category. Then there's Afro-Latinx immigrants who emigrated from Latin American countries but whose ancestors in those countries were slaves stolen from Afrifa; many of them identify strictly as Hispanic and not black, and many of those who identify as black are told by non-Latinx black Americans that they're more Hispanic than black. Then there's Africans in Africa, many of whom feel solidarity with black Americans and consider them to be one people, then there's Africans who feel they're completely separate from black Americans and that the concept of race and blackness is not as important to their identity as it is for black Americans.

So, most of the time when we talk about black people, most of us agree on who we're talking about. Nevertheless, there is contention, especially when you try to pin down a specific definitive definition. That's the same thing with trying to pin down a specific definition for women or men.

You’re just proving my point that black has no definition beyond how people want to define it because people define it based on totally arbritary things. If gender is the same, then there’s nothing wrong with saying, “there’s only two genders, and they’re based in biological sex.”

Again, not my point. My point is, while looking to pin down a specific definition is going to involve semantic debate, we all agree that black people exist, just as we agree that men and women exist (I'm going to assume you don't believe nonbinary people exist, though I'd be happy to he proven wrong, so I'll leave them out of this for now, no pun intended). To exclude people who are clearly black who identify as black from being black based on whatever semantic loophole — perhaps they're an African or a Latin American immigrant, perhaps they're multiracial with whute-passing parents — defeats the purpose of racial categorization in general. To exclude someone who is clearly a man who identifies as a man — and let's add that this theoretical man has a penis and is legally recognized as man — from being a man because he wasn't born with a penis, and perhaps he gave birth before medically transitioning (but after socially transitioning), defeats the purpose of gender labels. If that's not a man, then what is he?

Black people exist because human beings have crafted the category of “black” to put human beings into. Males are not males because they happen to fit into some man-made categorization of human beings based on arbitrary characteristics, because maleness is 100% a real, biological phenomenon, distinct from femaleness.

[Utah Neolib]

This is going to become a 20 page thread

[Mr. Reactionary]

If that's not a man, then what is he?

He's a transman.

Yes or no: Is a trans man a man?

If a "transman" (don't think your lack of a space went unnoticed) is not a man in your view, but he is still a "transman" rather than a woman, then you acknowledge that gender is not the same as the genitals a person is born with, correct?

More or less. Its certainly the same 95+% of the time which is why its an extremely useful shorthand but yeah there are a small % of crossovers which ive discussed on here. I think transmen should in most respects be treated as men. I do think its incredibly pedantic to get indignant if someone literally just points out that there are still biological differences that do matter in this distinction. Womens sports for example or sexual attraction or being naked in a spa around kids. Seems like the easiest thing to do is add a new category for the 1% rather than force through a redefinition on the 99%.

[John Dule]

It would appear from the records of classical antiquity and the various pre-colonial societies of Siberia, the Philippines, Latin America, and so on, that humans have understood gender identity as separate from birth sex for perhaps longer than humans have kept history; examples can be found around the world of societies that recognize a social role for those who adopt the mannerisms of the other sex or of some liminal space between the two, at times within a religious context (some folks, including our own trans-adjacent pal Nathan, argue that gender dysphoria is best understood as a spiritual experience, although surely this won't appeal to you). Even setting aside gender non-conformity, gender roles have varied and evolved in various societies throughout history, some societies adopting characteristics in one gender that others see more in another, to the point that we can reject any idea of gender being solely informed by innate qualities of sex rather than subjective societal ideas.

Thus one might turn the premise on its head and ask, as I hinted at above: why has Western Civilization™ seen fit to reject these understandings in favor of the idea that there is no difference between sex and gender? Why don't you have to prove that the muxe or the babaylan are invalid ways of understanding oneself in relation to one's body or the ideas that emerge from bodies and that we instead must conform strictly to what we were born with? Why don't you have to prove that when I feel the sensation of compression squeezing hips inwards that beg to be those of a woman it's best merely to live with that deeply harrowing sensation rather than take a medication that my doctor at a world-renowned hospital has prescribed me with the aim of alleviating that phenomenon and making my form resemble what it tells me that it ought to be?

Ultimately, I can only speak from my personal experience and my own understandings of these ideas far greater than the scope of one person's understanding. I hope that I have done justice to these experiences and the great weight of questions that our species has pondered for as long as we have known thought.

I won't comment on your personal anecdotes and experiences. However, I will say this: Most of the historical "third genders" in other cultures that trans people point to are either not analogous to their cause or were fabricated quite recently (e.g. "Two-Spirit"). And in any case, the way that Siberians or Filipinos choose to communicate has no bearing on communication in English. If you want to add a word as stupid as "xir" to my vocabulary, you had better demonstrate pretty conclusively that it is useful in communication-- which it isn't, by the simple fact that 99% of people have no idea what it means or refers to. Other languages gender all their nouns, but you don't see me doing that in English and then arguing that the burden is on you to show why I shouldn't do that. If I were to do such a thing, I would probably come across as a tad unhinged.

The fact that the roles we assign to the sexes have changed does not mean the sexes themselves have changed. Another thing the gender crew likes to throw around is that picture of FDR in a dress. What exactly do things like this prove? Yes, gender roles are mutable. That was never in question.

Anyway, you seem to understand that I have no interest in giving attention or legitimacy to anything "spiritual," and I certainly will not alter the way I use language in order to conform to such a thing. You might as well tell me that I have to believe in ghosts because of the "experiences" a few dingbats have had with them. But as always, consenting adults are free to do as they choose, and no one has any right to stop you from seeking surgery so that your outward self matches your inward self. I think the trans movement would be better served by a heightened focus on the individual rather than demanding some kind of Hegelian recognition of their identity from everyone else in society-- my opinion on this shouldn't matter to you, nor should yours matter to me. So long as I don't violate your bodily autonomy by preventing you from getting surgery and you don't violate my right to free speech by making "misgendering" an offense, we shouldn't care what the other thinks.

[President of the great nation of 🏳️‍⚧️]

This is going to become a 20 page thread

"Can a man get pregnant" - the greatest thread in the history of forums, locked by a moderator after 12,239 pages of heated debate,

[If my soul was made of stone]

It would appear from the records of classical antiquity and the various pre-colonial societies of Siberia, the Philippines, Latin America, and so on, that humans have understood gender identity as separate from birth sex for perhaps longer than humans have kept history; examples can be found around the world of societies that recognize a social role for those who adopt the mannerisms of the other sex or of some liminal space between the two, at times within a religious context (some folks, including our own trans-adjacent pal Nathan, argue that gender dysphoria is best understood as a spiritual experience, although surely this won't appeal to you). Even setting aside gender non-conformity, gender roles have varied and evolved in various societies throughout history, some societies adopting characteristics in one gender that others see more in another, to the point that we can reject any idea of gender being solely informed by innate qualities of sex rather than subjective societal ideas.

Thus one might turn the premise on its head and ask, as I hinted at above: why has Western Civilization™ seen fit to reject these understandings in favor of the idea that there is no difference between sex and gender? Why don't you have to prove that the muxe or the babaylan are invalid ways of understanding oneself in relation to one's body or the ideas that emerge from bodies and that we instead must conform strictly to what we were born with? Why don't you have to prove that when I feel the sensation of compression squeezing hips inwards that beg to be those of a woman it's best merely to live with that deeply harrowing sensation rather than take a medication that my doctor at a world-renowned hospital has prescribed me with the aim of alleviating that phenomenon and making my form resemble what it tells me that it ought to be?

Ultimately, I can only speak from my personal experience and my own understandings of these ideas far greater than the scope of one person's understanding. I hope that I have done justice to these experiences and the great weight of questions that our species has pondered for as long as we have known thought.

I won't comment on your personal anecdotes and experiences. However, I will say this: Most of the historical "third genders" in other cultures that trans people point to are either not analogous to their cause or were fabricated quite recently (e.g. "Two-Spirit"). And in any case, the way that Siberians or Filipinos choose to communicate has no bearing on communication in English. If you want to add a word as stupid as "xir" to my vocabulary, you had better demonstrate pretty conclusively that it is useful in communication-- which it isn't, by the simple fact that 99% of people have no idea what it means or refers to. Other languages gender all their nouns, but you don't see me doing that in English and then arguing that the burden is on you to show why I shouldn't do that. If I were to do such a thing, I would probably come across as a tad unhinged.

The fact that the roles we assign to the sexes have changed does not mean the sexes themselves have changed. Another thing the gender crew likes to throw around is that picture of FDR in a dress. What exactly do things like this prove? Yes, gender roles are mutable. That was never in question.

Anyway, you seem to understand that I have no interest in giving attention or legitimacy to anything "spiritual," and I certainly will not alter the way I use language in order to conform to such a thing. You might as well tell me that I have to believe in ghosts because of the "experiences" a few dingbats have had with them. But as always, consenting adults are free to do as they choose, and no one has any right to stop you from seeking surgery so that your outward self matches your inward self. I think the trans movement would be better served by a heightened focus on the individual rather than demanding some kind of Hegelian recognition of their identity from everyone else in society-- my opinion on this shouldn't matter to you, nor should yours matter to me. So long as I don't violate your bodily autonomy by preventing you from getting surgery and you don't violate my right to free speech by making "misgendering" an offense, we shouldn't care what the other thinks.

The term "two-spirit" is indeed of fairly recent coinage, replacing prior terminology that is now considered outdated and offensive, and folks who subscribe to the contemporary Western conception of transness trying to totalize them as part of their milieu are engaging in misguided cultural imperialism, but those cultures did/do indeed have conceptions of gender non-conformity.

I never meant to imply that there should be any tangible penalty (besides being gently corrected) for misgendering, which I consider very frivolous; however, too many people blur the line in bad faith and insist that even being politely told to call someone by another pronoun that they prefer is censorship, which I don't have the time to deal with.

[Klobmentum Mutilated Herself]

If that's not a man, then what is he?

He's a transman.

Yes or no: Is a trans man a man?

If a "transman" (don't think your lack of a space went unnoticed) is not a man in your view, but he is still a "transman" rather than a woman, then you acknowledge that gender is not the same as the genitals a person is born with, correct?

More or less. Its certainly the same 95+% of the time which is why its an extremely useful shorthand but yeah there are a small % of crossovers which ive discussed on here. I think transmen should in most respects be treated as men. I do think its incredibly pedantic to get indignant if someone literally just points out that there are still biological differences that do matter in this distinction. Womens sports for example or sexual attraction or being naked in a spa around kids. Seems like the easiest thing to do is add a new category for the 1% rather than force through a redefinition on the 99%.

Nobody has said there aren't differences between trans and cis people of the same gender, just as there are differences between trans people and other trans people, and between cis people and other cis people. But so long as you can accept a trans man is not a woman despite being born with a vulva, what is keeping you from accepting that a trans man is a man? To say they are men is not to say they're exactly the same as cis men.

[Klobmentum Mutilated Herself]

No one is “objectively” not black from a definition that is not inherently arbitrary.

Just because you're ignorant of the debate between how to categorize racial categories does not mean the debate does not exist with similar contention to the debate over gender definitions.

Ask any mixed raced person, especially someone who is 1/4 or less black if their blackness is universally accepted as valid, in the black community or out of it. There is debate on whether Africans Descended from Slaves and African immigrants belong in the same category. Then there's Afro-Latinx immigrants who emigrated from Latin American countries but whose ancestors in those countries were slaves stolen from Afrifa; many of them identify strictly as Hispanic and not black, and many of those who identify as black are told by non-Latinx black Americans that they're more Hispanic than black. Then there's Africans in Africa, many of whom feel solidarity with black Americans and consider them to be one people, then there's Africans who feel they're completely separate from black Americans and that the concept of race and blackness is not as important to their identity as it is for black Americans.

So, most of the time when we talk about black people, most of us agree on who we're talking about. Nevertheless, there is contention, especially when you try to pin down a specific definitive definition. That's the same thing with trying to pin down a specific definition for women or men.

You’re just proving my point that black has no definition beyond how people want to define it because people define it based on totally arbritary things. If gender is the same, then there’s nothing wrong with saying, “there’s only two genders, and they’re based in biological sex.”

Again, not my point. My point is, while looking to pin down a specific definition is going to involve semantic debate, we all agree that black people exist, just as we agree that men and women exist (I'm going to assume you don't believe nonbinary people exist, though I'd be happy to he proven wrong, so I'll leave them out of this for now, no pun intended). To exclude people who are clearly black who identify as black from being black based on whatever semantic loophole — perhaps they're an African or a Latin American immigrant, perhaps they're multiracial with whute-passing parents — defeats the purpose of racial categorization in general. To exclude someone who is clearly a man who identifies as a man — and let's add that this theoretical man has a penis and is legally recognized as man — from being a man because he wasn't born with a penis, and perhaps he gave birth before medically transitioning (but after socially transitioning), defeats the purpose of gender labels. If that's not a man, then what is he?

Black people exist because human beings have crafted the category of “black” to put human beings into. Males are not males because they happen to fit into some man-made categorization of human beings based on arbitrary characteristics, because maleness is 100% a real, biological phenomenon, distinct from femaleness.

Gender. And. Sex. Are. Not. The. Same. Thing.

Man. And. Male. Mean. Different. Things.

Woman.  And. Female. Mean. Different. Things.