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PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   29569 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 26, 2024

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Sure, but what does ‘female’ and ‘male’ mean?

Ultimately, it comes down to biological sex. The actual definition of a trans woman is ‘a biological male by sex who performs a social role or set of roles associated with women’. The question thereof comes down to ‘why should we care’. Like the social roles associated with women that aren’t on some level arbitrary are the ones a male-sexed person can’t perform anyways.

Like the social roles associated with women that aren’t on some level arbitrary are the ones a male-sexed person can’t perform anyways.

It's worth noting that there isn't broad agreement about what these differences in gender roles are. As far as I can tell, the entire war between trans activists and radical feminists happened because a specific sect of feminism denies that there is (or ought to be, at least) a difference between those gender roles. If women can be, say, firemenfighters, there isn't a distinct "men" gender role to mismatch with your mechanical parts, and so from their perspective the entire idea is nonsensical.

I've always found it odd that radical feminists hold some of the strongest objections to men who voluntarily emasculate and feminise themselves while it reads as a rad fem fantasy.

If the choice were between encouraging men to emasculate themselves at the cost of sharing the label of "woman" with them versus the essentialist position of telling men that they'll never be women so stop trying I would have assumed they'd choose the former.

I don't always find myself agreeing with the most radical egalitarian types, but I can at least accept their viewpoints. We've largely broadened the definition of "woman" to include anything a man can do (specific corner cases, maybe not). But they weren't really successful, as far as I can tell, at broadening the definition of "men". We haven't really increased the acceptance of men in caregiving roles, or even wearing traditionally women's attire -- the reverse pant suit, as it were.

I'm not planning to do it myself, but "I'm not a trans woman, I'm a man wearing a perfectly egalitarian dress. Don't assume my gender. " would at least be an interesting wrench to throw into the debate.

I'm not planning to do it myself, but "I'm not a trans woman, I'm a man wearing a perfectly egalitarian dress. Don't assume my gender. " would at least be an interesting wrench to throw into the debate.

It's already been done. The shitstorm was pretty funny.

In my experience, TERFs tend to be a lot more chill with trans women who've undergone bottom surgery than with those who haven't. They tend to find males with fully intact male genitalia but who still want to be considered "women" much more aggravating/threatening than males without, for understandable reasons.

Sure, but what does ‘female’ and ‘male’ mean?

They're clusters that were originally based around sex, yes, but plenty of cultures use the categories without referring back to sex these days. It's like how "2024 AD" means "two thousand and twenty four years after Jesus died"; you're making a fairly simple error if you think our calendar system relies on the existence of an actual biological Jesus.

The actual definition of a trans woman

I mean, every word has multiple definitions, especially a controversial phrase like that. But also: that wasn't the question that was being asked.

It's like how "2024 AD" means "two thousand and twenty four years after Jesus died"; you're making a fairly simple error if you think our calendar system relies on the existence of an actual biological Jesus.

This seems like a fundamentally flawed analogy. The choice of the year 1 as the starting point of the Gregorian calendar was arbitrary, meaningless and didn't refer to any actual historical event (even most historians no longer believe Jesus Christ was born in that specific year), but changing calendars is an enormous hassle, so we're stuck with this one even if it's based on something which is ultimately arbitrary and irrelevant. With you so far.

But the "clusters" that are based around the words "male" and "female" are not meaningless and arbitrary. In fact, the concepts associated with these words have more predictive power than almost anything in the biological (never mind social) sciences. For instance: 100% of human babies born via natural birth or C-section were gestated in the womb of a person whose body produced large gametes i.e. a female person. Conversely, 100% of the human people who impregnated another human person were people whose bodies produced small gametes i.e. male people.

Of course there's loads of ancillary, arbitrary and irrelevant nonsense associated with these two categories of human being (there's no reason that people whose bodies produce small gametes shouldn't wear pink clothes or dresses). But pointing out that there's loads of ancillary irrelevant nonsense associated with a given category of entity doesn't mean that the category itself is meaningless, or that the category doesn't "cleave reality at the joints" in a manner demonstrative of underlying physical laws. Boats still float on the water even if they are given a male name and no one gets around to smashing a bottle of champagne against the hull. "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away."

If you're measuring by gametes, then post-menopausal women are a third gender, and the same gender as a eunuch. Does that really seem like it cleaves reality at the joints?

That seems to be an attempt to make others adopt your frame that it is possible to change genders. If it is not assumed that it is possible to change genders, then it explains quite handily why a pre-pubescent or post- menopausal female is still considered a woman, and a post- castration male a man.

In biology there is always a "when functioning properly" attached to descriptions. A heart pumps blood "when functioning properly." A kidney filters waste "when functioning properly." A female organism produces large gametes at the species-appropriate point in the life cycle "when organs are functioning properly." Reproduction is generally only applicable at certain times in an organism's life cycle, but a bitch that isn't in heat is still a bitch.

I mean, you can change heart conditions and kidney conditions, why not everything else? We treat "people who have heart problems" as a discrete category regardless of whether it's congenital or not. No one sane is going around saying "well, your heart USED to function properly, so it's ridiculous to suggest you can transition into not functioning properly"

Also, really, "bitch"? C'mon, try to have some manners :)

The equivalent to changing heart conditions would be to go from a infertile to fertile, which happens all the time without changing sex. I'm not convinced you understand me and I don't know any way to be clearer.

We do have categories for female too young to be fertile - girl. But going from girl to woman is not a change in sex/gender, just a change in age. And going from infertile to fertile is not a change in sex/gender, just a change in health.

Do you not know what a bitch is or are you being cute? I would never call a woman a bitch, we are different species.

Edit: it's like you are claiming that someone with heart disease isn't in the phylum Chordata. A disease does not change a classification.

Edit: it's like you are claiming that someone with heart disease isn't in the phylum Chordata. A disease does not change a classification.

Do you think trans people are a different phylum? Do you think trans people are claiming to be a different phylum, or able to transition between phylums?

Like, if we're just talking general biology, hermaphroditism is hardly a controversial idea. Biology obviously supports the idea that individuals can change sexes. (And in case you're particularly bad at reading: no, I'm not claiming humans can do that yet; we're obviously still a few years away from an artificial uterus - which, hey, it's amusing that no one in this debate is willing to bite the bullet and discuss whether that'd be sufficient to qualify)

I'm not convinced you understand me and I don't know any way to be clearer.

I mean, you have the category of "was/will be fertile at some point", and the category of "never fertile at any point."

You then want me to take someone who was born XX but never developed a uterus, and put them in the... first category? That's a "woman" even though they don't have a uterus, will never produce gametes, and so on? But a trans woman, who also never developed a uterus, also has a vagina, also has breasts... that person is "male". And this is a totally consistent, natural, intuitive way to split people up?

Do you think trans people are a different phylum?

No, but a phylum is one biological classification. Sex is another.

A human whose heart has stopped working does not change phylums.

A human whose sexual organs have stopped functioning does not change sexes.

A human embryo that does not yet have a heart is in the phylum chordata.

A human child who does not yet have the capacity to bear a child is still female.

An imagined bionic human who no longer has a heart would still be in the phylum chordata.

A post-menopausal woman who no longer has a functioning uterus is still female.

The idea that someone can change classification is a Trans idea. It is not universal. I am specifically countering your objections that a woman with a hysterectomy or a post-menopausal woman is a different gender. They are not because sex/gender does not change. They have the qualities of their sex at some point in their lifecycle.

You are making a mistake that you think everyone thinks like you. You believe that you have changed sex/gender, and therefore whatever definition someone has for sex/gender allows for change.

In humans, there are four potential sexual categories (though only three in reality.)

  • Body produces large gametes in reality, or would have produced large gametes if health was obtained.

  • Body produces small gametes in reality, or would have produced small gametes if health was obtained.

  • Body produces neither small gametes or big gametes, and there is no obvious direction where health would go, even if Miracle Healer Jesus touched them. (Happens, though much rarer than the intersex statistics show, even a person with CAIS and XY chromosomes can become pregnant.)

  • (This category has never happened in a human) Body produces both small gametes and big gametes at the same time or at different times in the lifecycle.

What's funny is that there is a tradition of intersex people naturally transitioning and this being accepted in Christianity (below is a repost of a previous AAQC):

...Emperor Justinian's Digest of Roman law incorporated the statement of Ulpian, "The question has been asked:—according to which sex are hermaphrodites to be treated? but I should say on the whole that they ought to be treated as having the sex which predominates in them."

...The theologians of the School of Salamanca consider the case of a predominantly male hermaphrodite who has been ordained to the priesthood, licitly or illicitly, in whom the female sex has begun to predominate on account of ageing. They say "by reason of the changed sex" this person could no longer validly consecrate the Eucharist; the priestly character would remain in the soul, but would now be in the soul of a person not capable of exercising orders, just as a priest who has died can no longer consecrate the Eucharist. Considering the case of a woman who, "nature itself breaking out," is spontaneously transformed into a man, which they say Pliny the Elder testifies is not only possible but has in fact happened, the Salmanticenses say this man could be validly ordained, but unless the matter can be hidden, it cannot be done on account of the astonishment and scandal to those who would see someone they had known as a woman ministering at the altar.

So there is some discussion where someone who can perform the male role in sex can be a priest, even if they haven't always been able to perform the male role in intercourse.

However, that's a natural development of an intersex person's body. It's interesting that they talk about "nature itself breaking out." I don't think orthodox Christians will ever encourage someone to artificially change their sex, or believe that artificial changes are sufficient to actually change sex. If gender is in the soul, than it is the form of the body - the blueprint for what a body does on its own power.

I am perhaps more open than some of your interlocutors, at the least my philosophical and biological assumptions are very different. I still think you're a man, one that has become very sick. Restoring you to health would not involve you growing large gametes naturally and bearing children, it would involve you creating sperm and a mechanism to impregnate a woman. That is what is written into your body, the form of your body which you struggle against.

I know you believe that one day we will have control over these things, and there will be no difference. I believe that your sex is written into every cell of your body and is impossible to change, wherever medicine goes in the next century. Maybe through very artificial and mechanical methods will you approximate what my body does as easily as breathing, but that would not be the same as changing the powers of your body, you would be relying on a power outside you. The Abolition of Man and all that.

I know you wish it was one specific thing that defines sex, and then it would be something you could obtain for yourself (even theoretically, in some distant future) and then you have it. But sex isn't a thing a person possesses. It is one of the things a human person is.

More comments

Copy-pasting from my other comment:

Menopausal women's bodies once produced large gametes, but no longer do. That is a historical fact about their bodies. Just because someone has one of their legs amputated doesn't change the historical fact that they were bipedal from birth. Just as we consider prepubescent girls female because in most cases their bodies eventually will be capable of producing large gametes, we consider menopausal women female because their bodies once did produce large gametes: the arrow of time points both forwards and backwards. Likewise for eunuchs and prepubescent boys.

So, wait, you think people who lost their legs should still be considered bipedal? Like, you think they don't need a wheelchair, and we should laugh at them when they insist they've "transitioned" to needing a wheelchair?

How in the world is this cleaving reality in a coherent way, but "people who get treated as women" and "people who experience misogynistic sexism" are somehow radical ideas?

To reiterate: "Just because someone has one of their legs amputated doesn't change the historical fact that they were bipedal from birth." They are not currently bipedal, but they once were. A menopausal women is not currently producing large gametes, but she once did.

but "people who get treated as women" and "people who experience misogynistic sexism" are somehow radical ideas?

So your definition of "woman" is "anyone who gets treated as a woman" or "anyone who experiences misogynistic sexism"? Well, I can think of a number of objections that make your definition vastly less precise and meaningful than mine.

  1. "Treated by" whom? Do you have to be "treated as a woman" by everyone you meet to be considered a member of the category "women"? Is it sufficient if just one person "treats you as a woman" for you to call yourself a woman for ever and for always? Or is it democratic: if 100% of the people you meet "treat you as a woman" you are 100% woman, if 0% of them do you are a man, if you're androgynous enough that 50% of people think you're a woman and treat you accordingly, then you're neither man nor woman?
  2. This definition implies that any trans woman who doesn't pass (and indeed any cis woman with a masculine appearance) is not a woman. Fair enough, but probably not what you intended?
  3. What does it even mean to "treat someone as a woman"? You gave the example of people addressing people as either "sir" or "ma'am". When I meet a trans woman (and it's usually obvious), I'll refer to them using their preferred name or pronouns not because I literally believe they are a woman, but in an effort to keep the peace and avoid causing needless upset (in the worst case scenario, to avoid getting "cancelled"). This is quite distinct from "treating them as a woman".
  4. What does it even mean to "treat someone as a woman"?
  5. The definition of the latter category is circular and tautological, as all definitions used by trans activists inevitably turn out to be. "A woman is a person who experiences misogynistic sexism". Well, "misogyny" means "hatred of women", so everyone who experiences misogyny is a woman by default - one literally can't be the victim of misogyny without being a woman. "A woman is a person who experiences sexism rooted in hatred of people who experience sexism rooted in hatred of people who experience..." Outstanding.

Alright, fair enough, too advanced.

Let's try a simple definition as a thought exercise: women have vaginas, men have penises, and non-binary for everyone else. What's the flaw with that?

So, wait, you think people who lost their legs should still be considered bipedal?

No, but just as the existence of such people doesn't invalidate the definition of 'human' as 'a bipedal mammal', the existence of various edge cases does not invalidate the definition of 'woman' as 'producer of large gametes'.

If someone loses their legs, you don't call them bipedal, though. So why are you calling someone who loses their gametes a "woman"?

Does it really make sense to say "well, but you USED to be able to walk, so I'm still going to call you able-bodied"?

For basically everything else, we care about what a person's current condition is: we don't draw a huge distinction between people who were born needing a wheelchair -vs- people who were in an accident. Why does reality "cleave at the joints" differently for gametes vs legs?

If someone loses their legs, you don't call them bipedal, though.

You call them 'handicapped', or something else if there's enough of them that a more specific new category would be useful -- you wouldn't call such a person a serpent, though. Are you sure this is the route you'd like to take?

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Yes. They even exhibit the same kind of stereotypical behaviors, such as disproportionate use of the care/harm moral foundation and loyalty to established political order.

The energetic economics of reproduction are really quite enough to explain sex and sex stereotypes.

Veering into metaphysics can have merit, and there too I think the gnostic approach of gender theory is quite terrible, but that's not really necessary.

They're clusters that were originally based around sex, yes, but plenty of cultures use the categories without referring back to sex these days. It's like how "2024 AD" means "two thousand and twenty four years after Jesus died"; you're making a fairly simple error if you think our calendar system relies on the existence of an actual biological Jesus.

Those cultures are wrong. Not in the way that using AUC dating instead of AD dating would be on a sufficiently different page that answering '2777' to 'what year is it' would functionally be wrong, but wrong in the sense that it doesn't actually tell us anything. Pink skirts being associated with femininity doesn't have a particular reason behind it; skirts being associated with masculinity still exists in certain contexts, such as kilts or fustanella(this garment is even frilly). Pink is for girls and blue is for boys was the other way around in (barely)living memory, and in fact I can readily imagine a counterfactual world where girls wear blue because Virgin Mary and boys wear pink because that's what blood looks like on a white shirt. On the other hand, uteruses being feminine is obviously biological. Most historical cultures defined, and most cultures today define, femininity as uterus having, and the claim of transwomen is that in every way except having a uterus they are more like having one than not. This is functionally self-defeating for any claim to separate the biological fact of sex from the cluster 'women'.

Yeah. Just since the points of measure are arbitrary it's still an absolute distance that is being communicated whether you do so in Meters or Feet.

If you remove the uterus, does someone stop being a woman? Are you really excluding anyone who, via birth defect, didn't develop a uterus? If we figure out how to grow artificial organs, does that mean trans people become acceptable?

The category ‘women with severe health problems’ exists.

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