5 ms·

Sex is a biological concept, and not even a binary one, as intersex people exist, gender is a social concept. Sex is mostly based on a mix of genome and primar

by lagadu 5y ago

Sex is a biological concept, and not even a binary one, as intersex people exist, gender is a social concept. Sex is mostly based on a mix of genome and primary sexual characteristics. Gender is based on how one presents themselves in society and in turn gets treated by it, as our societies are very gendered. They're concepts in two very different domains, why would you assume them to be interdependent? They only tend to be statistically correlated in the same way that gender and sexuality tend to be: most people are heterosexual but the two are independent as being a man doesn't mean one is attracted to women. Same goes for gender, being born with female sex doesn't mean one's gender is female. Honestly I've some trouble understanding how some people find this to be such a hard concept, it's exactly the same thing as gender/sexuality and this is even without getting into that neither sex nor gender are binary, as shown biologically by intersex people and socially by the very article we're discussing.

esarbe 5y ago
Sex is very much a 'binary' concept; it's fundamentally tied to a property of reproduction strategies; the size of the gametes. To quote [0]: > The type of gametes produced by an organism defines its sex. Commonly in plants and animals, male organisms produce smaller gametes (spermatozoa, sperm) while female organisms produce larger gametes (ova, often called egg cells). Convention is; if you produce small gametes, you're male, if you produce big gametes, you're female. Sexual reproduction happens pretty much exclusively in two sexes. Biologically speaking, individuals that don't produce gametes, don't have a sex. To quote from [1]: > There are almost invariably only two gamete types, all analyses showing that intermediate gamete sizes are eliminated due to selection. Gender can be considered a cultural construct based upon the interpretation of sexually defined roles and strategies. But sex itself is binary. So "Intersex people" - your words, not mine - do exist but as an defective expression of the reproductive function, see above. I'm not aware of any medical condition in humans that results in functional hermaphrodity as seen in some plant species, that is; individuals that produce functional small and large gametes. Although there is a condition called 'True Hermaphrodity' whereas an individual develops both ovarian and testicular tissue, this does not result in functional gametes. > Sex is mostly based on a mix of genome There are many sex-determination mechanisms, not all of them involve different genomes. Some are based on temperature, for example. Again; see [0]. > Honestly I've some trouble understanding how some people find this to be such a hard concept, I do wonder that myself and I guess it's because for some people this is a placeholder for some kind of ideological discussion, separate from the actual discussion about sex. The impreciseness of colloquial language probably also plays a part. But to summarize; Gender: cultural construct based on interpretation of reproductive roles and strategies, pretty much unbounded in its expression and shape and form Sex: "binary" reproductive trait that comes in two expressions; male (small gametes) and female (large gametes), although there are some species where both male and female is expressed in single individuals. Sex doesn't necessarily depend on the chromosomes but in many species can also be decided by external factors. Hope that helps! [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamete https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamete
- lagadu 5y ago
  > Biologically speaking, individuals that don't produce gametes, don't have a sex. So you agree that it's not a binary trait: masculine, feminine and none is ternary. If people can come in those three flavours then we're beyond a binary. That said I'm fine with that definition but it does imply that we're excluding people who can't have children due to reproductive system defects as not having a sex despite having a gender, which further puts the two concepts apart from each other. Thank you for the thorough answer!
  - esarbe 5y ago
    > So you agree that it's not a binary trait: Ha, here's the question: Is the lack of a trait one of its expressions? Is 'none' a reproductive strategy or is it the absence of one? I guess ones view on the "binary" nature of sex very much depends on that. > [..] we're excluding people who can't have children due to reproductive system defects as not having a sex despite having a gender, which further puts the two concepts apart from each other. I think that is a very interesting question and debate. I broadly agree that this would be the implication, although I can see why many people would be uncomfortable with that. I think it would be good for the discussion of topics like the one in the original post if people had a clearer understanding that sex and gender - albeit related - are distinct concepts.
    - likeclockwork 5y ago
      Calling asexual reproductive capability a sex is like calling atheism a religious belief.

by lagadu 5y ago

esarbe 5y ago

Sex is very much a 'binary' concept; it's fundamentally tied to a property of reproduction strategies; the size of the gametes. To quote [0]: > The type of gametes produced by an organism defines its sex. Commonly in plants and animals, male organisms produce smaller gametes (spermatozoa, sperm) while female organisms produce larger gametes (ova, often called egg cells). Convention is; if you produce small gametes, you're male, if you produce big gametes, you're female. Sexual reproduction happens pretty much exclusively in two sexes. Biologically speaking, individuals that don't produce gametes, don't have a sex. To quote from [1]: > There are almost invariably only two gamete types, all analyses showing that intermediate gamete sizes are eliminated due to selection. Gender can be considered a cultural construct based upon the interpretation of sexually defined roles and strategies. But sex itself is binary. So "Intersex people" - your words, not mine - do exist but as an defective expression of the reproductive function, see above. I'm not aware of any medical condition in humans that results in functional hermaphrodity as seen in some plant species, that is; individuals that produce functional small and large gametes. Although there is a condition called 'True Hermaphrodity' whereas an individual develops both ovarian and testicular tissue, this does not result in functional gametes. > Sex is mostly based on a mix of genome There are many sex-determination mechanisms, not all of them involve different genomes. Some are based on temperature, for example. Again; see [0]. > Honestly I've some trouble understanding how some people find this to be such a hard concept, I do wonder that myself and I guess it's because for some people this is a placeholder for some kind of ideological discussion, separate from the actual discussion about sex. The impreciseness of colloquial language probably also plays a part. But to summarize; Gender: cultural construct based on interpretation of reproductive roles and strategies, pretty much unbounded in its expression and shape and form Sex: "binary" reproductive trait that comes in two expressions; male (small gametes) and female (large gametes), although there are some species where both male and female is expressed in single individuals. Sex doesn't necessarily depend on the chromosomes but in many species can also be decided by external factors. Hope that helps! [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamete https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamete

lagadu 5y ago
> Biologically speaking, individuals that don't produce gametes, don't have a sex. So you agree that it's not a binary trait: masculine, feminine and none is ternary. If people can come in those three flavours then we're beyond a binary. That said I'm fine with that definition but it does imply that we're excluding people who can't have children due to reproductive system defects as not having a sex despite having a gender, which further puts the two concepts apart from each other. Thank you for the thorough answer!
- esarbe 5y ago
  > So you agree that it's not a binary trait: Ha, here's the question: Is the lack of a trait one of its expressions? Is 'none' a reproductive strategy or is it the absence of one? I guess ones view on the "binary" nature of sex very much depends on that. > [..] we're excluding people who can't have children due to reproductive system defects as not having a sex despite having a gender, which further puts the two concepts apart from each other. I think that is a very interesting question and debate. I broadly agree that this would be the implication, although I can see why many people would be uncomfortable with that. I think it would be good for the discussion of topics like the one in the original post if people had a clearer understanding that sex and gender - albeit related - are distinct concepts.
  - likeclockwork 5y ago
    Calling asexual reproductive capability a sex is like calling atheism a religious belief.