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I never understood the "X is a social construct" argument. People seem to use it to dismiss ideas out of hand in my experience. Freedom of speech, rule of law,

I never understood the "X is a social construct" argument. People seem to use it to dismiss ideas out of hand in my experience. Freedom of speech, rule of law, and consenting to sex are similarly "social constructs" as in they aren't fundamental laws of the universe but they seem to be pretty good ideas. What is intended to be inferred by this argument?

Pfhreak 9y ago
There's a large group of people who believe that gender is a natural force in the world -- you are either a boy or a girl, because that's the way genetics is. I have had people tell me that boys like trucks and girls like dresses because of chemical differences in their brains. The gender is a social construct argument is the voice that believes the opposite -- that gender roles and expression are learned behavior in our society. Our parents and peers teach us what it means to be a boy or girl from a very young age, and what is socially unacceptable for those genders. (They also commonly teach us, here in the US, that there are only two genders.)
- Chris2048 9y ago
  You are talking about gender, as opposed to biological sex? But then, what is gender by that definition? If it is a social construct, what does it even mean to number them - they would be intangible constructs in the first place; it's like arguing there are only X canonical Marvel universes..
- kodt 9y ago
  Isn't it possible your biology gives you a natural tendency towards certain interests or activities and that these are reinforced and strengthened by society?
  - tachyonbeam 9y ago
    I think that's the most sensible hypothesis. Whenever there is a nature vs nurture question, the answer is usually "it's both".
- KekDemaga 9y ago
  >I have had people tell me that boys like trucks and girls like dresses because of chemical differences in their brains. In regards to gender differences I find some of the primate evidence[0][1] rather compelling. This doesn't mean that I believe any gender should be treated differently than the other of course but it seems rather obvious to me that some differences exist outside of any conditioning that human societies may provide. [0]http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/09/101220-chimpanzees-play-nature-nurture-science-animals-evolution/ http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/09/101220-chimp... [1]http://www.bbc.com/news/av/science-environment-29418230/monkey-test-shows-gender-choices http://www.bbc.com/news/av/science-environment-29418230/monk...
  - ZeroGravitas 9y ago
    Note that the primate evidence showed that the girls played equally with the stuffed animals and the wheeled toys. This reminds me of colour preference, where girls are more likely to say they like pink than boys and so people conclude pink is for girls and blue is for boys, yet if you ask what their favourite colour is, the top pick for both sexes is blue. So the evidence on trucks doesn't support the claim you replied to, but maybe they'd be on firmer ground if they said boys had proportionately less interest in stuffed toy animals than trucks.
    - KekDemaga 9y ago
      Not all instances of playing with something are equal. In terms of total interactions the females played with both the same number of instances but they also played with the dolls a significantly longer period of time.
      - ZeroGravitas 9y ago
        Specifically talking about this paper: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2583786/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2583786/ It seems the duration shows the same pattern as counting the number of interactions: "males interacted for a greater total time with wheeled than with plush objects while females did not differ in the duration of interactions with the toy types"
djsumdog 9y ago
There is a book call the Social Construction of Reality and, exactly like you're saying, everything in our society is a social construct. Schools, legal systems, states, money, war, debt .. they only exist because we believe they do. You can choose not to exist in something like the police and law, and go murder some people, but enough people believe in those constructs that they'll lock you up, or at the least, put you in a mental institution. There are people who have trouble understanding society with mental illnesses, and many of them end up on the streets. Hallucinations, bi-polar, schizo-effective people often have trouble working within the social constructions the rest of us take for granted. This wasn't really meant to answer your political issue, but just to provide a context of what is and isn't socially constructed.
hyperpape 9y ago
In general, social constructs aren't bad. But consider something like the lower representation of women in math. If it happens because of genetically different altitudes/interests then it's inevitable, and there's no use complaining about it. If it's because of society discouraging women, that's just plain dumb. (Btw: your examples are highly debatable. You can argue that consent and freedom of speech are social practices which respect objective moral/ethical facts).
- yorwba 9y ago
  > If it happens because of genetically different altitudes/interests then it's inevitable, and there's no use complaining about it. That's not actually true. Even when something is the expected outcome of certain biological factors, that doesn't make it inevitable. With the right kind of intervention, very little is completely biologically determined. That's what medicine is all about. In many ways, culture is also about overcoming the limits and defaults of human biology. There's no reason to suppose that differences between the sexes can't be influenced into a direction that appears more desirable.
  - hyperpape 9y ago
    That makes sense. I just wanted to point out that a purely cultural difference should be presumed guilty, whereas if there were genetically driven ones, they might not be. The real meat of the point is that a culturally driven difference in this realm is a bad thing.
jMyles 9y ago
> Freedom of speech, rule of law, and consenting to sex are similarly "social constructs" as in they aren' t fundamental laws of the universe This varies across philosophical traditions. Common-law traditions do, in a sense, hold these sorts of rights as part of the origin story of the universe.

Pfhreak 9y ago

There's a large group of people who believe that gender is a natural force in the world -- you are either a boy or a girl, because that's the way genetics is. I have had people tell me that boys like trucks and girls like dresses because of chemical differences in their brains. The gender is a social construct argument is the voice that believes the opposite -- that gender roles and expression are learned behavior in our society. Our parents and peers teach us what it means to be a boy or girl from a very young age, and what is socially unacceptable for those genders. (They also commonly teach us, here in the US, that there are only two genders.)

Chris2048 9y ago
You are talking about gender, as opposed to biological sex? But then, what is gender by that definition? If it is a social construct, what does it even mean to number them - they would be intangible constructs in the first place; it's like arguing there are only X canonical Marvel universes..
kodt 9y ago
Isn't it possible your biology gives you a natural tendency towards certain interests or activities and that these are reinforced and strengthened by society?
- tachyonbeam 9y ago
  I think that's the most sensible hypothesis. Whenever there is a nature vs nurture question, the answer is usually "it's both".
KekDemaga 9y ago
>I have had people tell me that boys like trucks and girls like dresses because of chemical differences in their brains. In regards to gender differences I find some of the primate evidence[0][1] rather compelling. This doesn't mean that I believe any gender should be treated differently than the other of course but it seems rather obvious to me that some differences exist outside of any conditioning that human societies may provide. [0]http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/09/101220-chimpanzees-play-nature-nurture-science-animals-evolution/ http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/09/101220-chimp... [1]http://www.bbc.com/news/av/science-environment-29418230/monkey-test-shows-gender-choices http://www.bbc.com/news/av/science-environment-29418230/monk...
- ZeroGravitas 9y ago
  Note that the primate evidence showed that the girls played equally with the stuffed animals and the wheeled toys. This reminds me of colour preference, where girls are more likely to say they like pink than boys and so people conclude pink is for girls and blue is for boys, yet if you ask what their favourite colour is, the top pick for both sexes is blue. So the evidence on trucks doesn't support the claim you replied to, but maybe they'd be on firmer ground if they said boys had proportionately less interest in stuffed toy animals than trucks.
  - KekDemaga 9y ago
    Not all instances of playing with something are equal. In terms of total interactions the females played with both the same number of instances but they also played with the dolls a significantly longer period of time.
    - ZeroGravitas 9y ago
      Specifically talking about this paper: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2583786/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2583786/ It seems the duration shows the same pattern as counting the number of interactions: "males interacted for a greater total time with wheeled than with plush objects while females did not differ in the duration of interactions with the toy types"

djsumdog 9y ago

There is a book call the Social Construction of Reality and, exactly like you're saying, everything in our society is a social construct. Schools, legal systems, states, money, war, debt .. they only exist because we believe they do. You can choose not to exist in something like the police and law, and go murder some people, but enough people believe in those constructs that they'll lock you up, or at the least, put you in a mental institution. There are people who have trouble understanding society with mental illnesses, and many of them end up on the streets. Hallucinations, bi-polar, schizo-effective people often have trouble working within the social constructions the rest of us take for granted. This wasn't really meant to answer your political issue, but just to provide a context of what is and isn't socially constructed.

hyperpape 9y ago

In general, social constructs aren't bad. But consider something like the lower representation of women in math. If it happens because of genetically different altitudes/interests then it's inevitable, and there's no use complaining about it. If it's because of society discouraging women, that's just plain dumb. (Btw: your examples are highly debatable. You can argue that consent and freedom of speech are social practices which respect objective moral/ethical facts).

yorwba 9y ago
> If it happens because of genetically different altitudes/interests then it's inevitable, and there's no use complaining about it. That's not actually true. Even when something is the expected outcome of certain biological factors, that doesn't make it inevitable. With the right kind of intervention, very little is completely biologically determined. That's what medicine is all about. In many ways, culture is also about overcoming the limits and defaults of human biology. There's no reason to suppose that differences between the sexes can't be influenced into a direction that appears more desirable.
- hyperpape 9y ago
  That makes sense. I just wanted to point out that a purely cultural difference should be presumed guilty, whereas if there were genetically driven ones, they might not be. The real meat of the point is that a culturally driven difference in this realm is a bad thing.

jMyles 9y ago

> Freedom of speech, rule of law, and consenting to sex are similarly "social constructs" as in they aren' t fundamental laws of the universe This varies across philosophical traditions. Common-law traditions do, in a sense, hold these sorts of rights as part of the origin story of the universe.