5 ms·

“Pregnant Women”

43 points by leephillips 5y ago

ant0n-anon 5y ago
they will never be a real woman
throwawaysea 5y ago
I think trans people are deserving of respect, basic rights, and civil liberties. However I also think that trans right activists of the current era have overreached in trying to force everyone to believe trans people are whatever gender they declare, rather than a separate third category, as other older cultures have recognized. I find the resulting awkward nomenclature pushed by activists in the last few years to be both incorrect and harmful. It’s incorrect because a “woman” is an “adult human female” by definition (https://www.dictionary.com/browse/woman https://www.dictionary.com/browse/woman), meaning a grown up biological female, where female means of the sex capable of reproducing. I think using newly made up phrases like “pregnant people” or “birthing people” are harmful because they constitute an erasure of identity (for women and mothers). They are not just a denial of truth or difference of opinion, and they will lead to more extreme distortions. For example, the American Medical Association is about to begin lobbying to stop noting sex on birth certificates (https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/ama-to-urge-end-of-sex-id-on-all-birth-certificates/ https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/ama-to-urge-end-of-sex...), because the AMA believes people can determine what sex (in addition to “gender”) they identify with. The rapid institutionalization of a new radical set of definitions and scrutiny (socially and professionally) over allowed/disallowed speech is disturbing, particularly because it reflects the desires of a small but vocal activist group and not broader society. The bureaucracy of diversity officers referenced in this blog post is an enabling mechanism for this type of distortion, because free inquiry and dissent are discouraged by implicit fear of reprisal, and this body therefore acts more like a “ministry of truth” from the Soviet era. I’m not surprised to see this Professor end the post by asking that 1984 once again be made required reading for Harvard students.
- TheIronYuppie 5y ago
  Please define “woman”. This is not sarcasm. What you’ve generally been taught about the binariness of these terms is an oversimplification to say the least, and wrong. Read Galileo’s Middle Finger as an excellent primer.
  - rcoumet 5y ago
    We shall see who's the last man standing after the upcoming civil war.
  - jollybean 5y ago
    The intellectual aggrandization of what are actually classification issues at the margins is the problem. That the edge points of group inclusion become more subjective or inconclusive, does not abnegate the very obvious reality of overall group determination. We fully accept that there is a material ratio of people who don't fit clear categorization ... but most people do ... and that' really important artifact of sex and gender. It's not 'grey'. It's mostly 'pretty black and pretty white' with some interesting bits in the middle. We are 'mostly' binary, it's really obvious, and fighting against that fact is a woeful place for people and institutions to lose all of their credibility, which over time they will, and it will be bad. 'Wrong side of history' bad. We're already trying to convince people that vaccines are generally safe, and to accept that 'the grey areas' of gender do truly exist and to stop hating on trans people, to stop being racist etc.. Those are the important things. And from a populist perspective, I can't imagine a bigger losing strategy than shaming people for saying 'Pregnant Women'. There are so many obvious 'good fights' to be worked on (not just social issue either), let's focus there.
  - arvigeus 5y ago
    Imagine going to a fast food shop to order a pizza. The Italian cashier says they don't have pizzas. You can clearly see bunch of pizzas displayed next to him, with price tags and everything. What's the problem then? Well, according to the Italian cashier, this is not really a pizza. It does not fit the definition of pizza they have in Italy. If you want to order it, you have to say "Give me that bread with meat and vegetables on top". If you go to another shop and say that, they will look you like you are mental. This is the problem. For every definition of woman I can give you, you can easily dispute with counter argument. So we get "something". Undefined, because every definition is flawed. We end up with an overcomplicated system because we want to be accurate. If you think woman is a woman and pizza is a pizza - you are wrong. And we make so much fuss about it.
readflaggedcomm 5y ago
Relatedly, "birthing person" is used in some legislature, probably after the pregnancy (if that's what it's still called): https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=PEN&sectionNum=4023.8 https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio....
krastanov 5y ago
It would be interesting when we develop the technology to grow and implant functional uteri (uteruses?) in anyone who wants them, independently of their gender/sex/chromosomes. So much of this discussion will become obsolete and we will definitely end up needing updated vocabulary.
- nine_k 5y ago
  A logical development of that would be growing an uterus, and a baby inside it, completely inside a machine. The biological parents would only provide the fertilized egg. A lot of vocabulary would need to change then.
  - krastanov 5y ago
    I completely agree that this would be the logical development. I am also certain that enough people would want to get an uterus implanted and carry a baby to term anyway.
nine_k 5y ago
The rejection of queer people initially came from rejection of a scientifically provable fact that humans do not always develop the mental picture of their gender matching their biological sex. Rejecting the reality in favor of the prevalent ideology and forcing norms based on it produced pointless suffering and broken lives. The rejection of "pregnant women" came from rejection of a scientifically provable fact that humans do have a female sex, and the vast majority of pregnant people are of that sex and gender, colloquially called women. Rejecting the reality in favor of the prevalent ideology and forcing norms based on it right now fortunately just produces awkwardness, and no broken lives as of yet, but the trend is worrying enough. The sad part of it is that the whole thing is happening not in a temple where divine prescriptions overrule any observed reality, and not on an anonymous imageboard where "bitards" develop silly rules and keep silly discourses for, let's assume it, fun. It's happening in a university, in a department of a natural-scientific discipline that normally operates observable facts and is assumed to honor the Descartes' maxim.
CodeGlitch 5y ago
Amazed this hasn't been flagged yet. Any discussion on the subject usually is (which tells a lot about the ideology behind trans-rights).
- CodeGlitch 5y ago
  Well look at that - it got flagged.
  - leephillips 5y ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27984816 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27984816
jgb1984 5y ago
Woke is a sickness.
- xemoka 5y ago
  So is being an asshole. Shame we can’t meet middle way with either attitude.
  - lostmsu 5y ago
    Are you implying anyone who is not woke is an asshole?
myWindoonn 5y ago
There are more than two configurations for sexual chromosomes. Dr. Hooven is apparently not educated on how genes work. Edit: Downvoters are apparently not educated on genetics either. First please read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex and reconsider your position. If you're not moved, then please leave a comment explaining yourselves.
hackeraccount 5y ago
I think discussions about terminology are ones about political will more often then not. There are often reasons given which may be reasonable or may not be but the root cause is an imposition of will on reality.

43 points by leephillips 5y ago

they will never be a real woman

I think trans people are deserving of respect, basic rights, and civil liberties. However I also think that trans right activists of the current era have overreached in trying to force everyone to believe trans people are whatever gender they declare, rather than a separate third category, as other older cultures have recognized. I find the resulting awkward nomenclature pushed by activists in the last few years to be both incorrect and harmful. It’s incorrect because a “woman” is an “adult human female” by definition (https://www.dictionary.com/browse/woman https://www.dictionary.com/browse/woman), meaning a grown up biological female, where female means of the sex capable of reproducing. I think using newly made up phrases like “pregnant people” or “birthing people” are harmful because they constitute an erasure of identity (for women and mothers). They are not just a denial of truth or difference of opinion, and they will lead to more extreme distortions. For example, the American Medical Association is about to begin lobbying to stop noting sex on birth certificates (https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/ama-to-urge-end-of-sex-id-on-all-birth-certificates/ https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/ama-to-urge-end-of-sex...), because the AMA believes people can determine what sex (in addition to “gender”) they identify with. The rapid institutionalization of a new radical set of definitions and scrutiny (socially and professionally) over allowed/disallowed speech is disturbing, particularly because it reflects the desires of a small but vocal activist group and not broader society. The bureaucracy of diversity officers referenced in this blog post is an enabling mechanism for this type of distortion, because free inquiry and dissent are discouraged by implicit fear of reprisal, and this body therefore acts more like a “ministry of truth” from the Soviet era. I’m not surprised to see this Professor end the post by asking that 1984 once again be made required reading for Harvard students.

TheIronYuppie 5y ago
Please define “woman”. This is not sarcasm. What you’ve generally been taught about the binariness of these terms is an oversimplification to say the least, and wrong. Read Galileo’s Middle Finger as an excellent primer.
- rcoumet 5y ago
  We shall see who's the last man standing after the upcoming civil war.
- jollybean 5y ago
  The intellectual aggrandization of what are actually classification issues at the margins is the problem. That the edge points of group inclusion become more subjective or inconclusive, does not abnegate the very obvious reality of overall group determination. We fully accept that there is a material ratio of people who don't fit clear categorization ... but most people do ... and that' really important artifact of sex and gender. It's not 'grey'. It's mostly 'pretty black and pretty white' with some interesting bits in the middle. We are 'mostly' binary, it's really obvious, and fighting against that fact is a woeful place for people and institutions to lose all of their credibility, which over time they will, and it will be bad. 'Wrong side of history' bad. We're already trying to convince people that vaccines are generally safe, and to accept that 'the grey areas' of gender do truly exist and to stop hating on trans people, to stop being racist etc.. Those are the important things. And from a populist perspective, I can't imagine a bigger losing strategy than shaming people for saying 'Pregnant Women'. There are so many obvious 'good fights' to be worked on (not just social issue either), let's focus there.
- arvigeus 5y ago
  Imagine going to a fast food shop to order a pizza. The Italian cashier says they don't have pizzas. You can clearly see bunch of pizzas displayed next to him, with price tags and everything. What's the problem then? Well, according to the Italian cashier, this is not really a pizza. It does not fit the definition of pizza they have in Italy. If you want to order it, you have to say "Give me that bread with meat and vegetables on top". If you go to another shop and say that, they will look you like you are mental. This is the problem. For every definition of woman I can give you, you can easily dispute with counter argument. So we get "something". Undefined, because every definition is flawed. We end up with an overcomplicated system because we want to be accurate. If you think woman is a woman and pizza is a pizza - you are wrong. And we make so much fuss about it.

readflaggedcomm 5y ago

Relatedly, "birthing person" is used in some legislature, probably after the pregnancy (if that's what it's still called): https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=PEN&sectionNum=4023.8 https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio....

krastanov 5y ago

It would be interesting when we develop the technology to grow and implant functional uteri (uteruses?) in anyone who wants them, independently of their gender/sex/chromosomes. So much of this discussion will become obsolete and we will definitely end up needing updated vocabulary.

nine_k 5y ago
A logical development of that would be growing an uterus, and a baby inside it, completely inside a machine. The biological parents would only provide the fertilized egg. A lot of vocabulary would need to change then.
- krastanov 5y ago
  I completely agree that this would be the logical development. I am also certain that enough people would want to get an uterus implanted and carry a baby to term anyway.

nine_k 5y ago

The rejection of queer people initially came from rejection of a scientifically provable fact that humans do not always develop the mental picture of their gender matching their biological sex. Rejecting the reality in favor of the prevalent ideology and forcing norms based on it produced pointless suffering and broken lives. The rejection of "pregnant women" came from rejection of a scientifically provable fact that humans do have a female sex, and the vast majority of pregnant people are of that sex and gender, colloquially called women. Rejecting the reality in favor of the prevalent ideology and forcing norms based on it right now fortunately just produces awkwardness, and no broken lives as of yet, but the trend is worrying enough. The sad part of it is that the whole thing is happening not in a temple where divine prescriptions overrule any observed reality, and not on an anonymous imageboard where "bitards" develop silly rules and keep silly discourses for, let's assume it, fun. It's happening in a university, in a department of a natural-scientific discipline that normally operates observable facts and is assumed to honor the Descartes' maxim.

CodeGlitch 5y ago

Amazed this hasn't been flagged yet. Any discussion on the subject usually is (which tells a lot about the ideology behind trans-rights).

CodeGlitch 5y ago
Well look at that - it got flagged.
- leephillips 5y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27984816 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27984816

jgb1984 5y ago

Woke is a sickness.

xemoka 5y ago
So is being an asshole. Shame we can’t meet middle way with either attitude.
- lostmsu 5y ago
  Are you implying anyone who is not woke is an asshole?

myWindoonn 5y ago

There are more than two configurations for sexual chromosomes. Dr. Hooven is apparently not educated on how genes work. Edit: Downvoters are apparently not educated on genetics either. First please read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex and reconsider your position. If you're not moved, then please leave a comment explaining yourselves.

hackeraccount 5y ago

I think discussions about terminology are ones about political will more often then not. There are often reasons given which may be reasonable or may not be but the root cause is an imposition of will on reality.