8 ms·

I'm not sure if they felt 'attacked'- more that they were standing up for their right to do what they do (satire) without being censored and giving into the cen

• socialismisok 4y ago
  It's not "absolutely true in the scientific sense", except at the "I have an understanding of high school level biology and sociology" sense. Sex and gender are both significantly more complex than just chromosomes, genitalia, or organs. If you are interested, I'm happy to dive into a good faith discussion of where the science actually falls.
  • ghostpepper 4y ago
    Why not assume there are many readers here who are interested in good faith discussion and just go ahead and post a summary of the science?
    • socialismisok 4y ago
      Typically because that could be a long post, and it might not be what the parent wants too engage with. I like to invite folks, rather than make assumptions about their preferences. The invitation is open to the community, of course!
  • fallingknife 4y ago
    And if you want to make that argument, fine. But when people are banning those who disagree, I will reflexively side with those banned and against the people doing the banning, whether or not I agree with them.
    • xadhominemx 4y ago
      • fallingknife 4y ago
        That's not an argument
        • xadhominemx 4y ago
          Did you not say “But when people are banning those who disagree, I will reflexively side with those banned and against the people doing the banning, whether or not I agree with them”?
        • socialismisok 4y ago
          That's literally the argument you made.
  • NaturalPhallacy 4y ago
    >Sex and gender are both significantly more complex than just chromosomes, genitalia, or organs. Everyone reading this needs to look up John Money. The founding father of "sex and gender are different".
    • Shared404 4y ago
      What happened to Reimer was a travesty, and an affront to human decency on all levels. That doesn't change the truth that gender and biological sex are both characteristics of the human experience - usually they line up, and sometimes they don't.
      • NaturalPhallacy 4y ago
        >That doesn't change the truth that gender and biological sex are both characteristics of the human experience - usually they line up, and sometimes they don't. I think it does, as that's the foundation of the notion. Prior to that, they were completely interchangeable and authors would use "gender" to mean "sex" where it was considered more crass to say "sex". Gender is just a euphemism for sex.
        • Shared404 4y ago
          You have causality backwards. It was believed that since they were not the same thing it would be possible to safely raise someone as an arbitrary gender despite that not being the case. The failure is in that both gender and sex are biological characteristics, and at that point in time Money believed that gender was strictly social - which is _clearly_ inaccurate. In short - Reimer was forced into the life of being a trans person, despite having been born cis.
  • figjinbgj 4y ago
  • woooooo 4y ago
    Matter of opinion. I wouldn't deliberately misgender someone just to be a jerk, but the idea suite you're referencing was a niche viewpoint 7 years ago or so. It's kind of incredible to go from there to "this is a settled mandatory philosophical viewpoint and disagreement is banished" in such a short time.
    • socialismisok 4y ago
      If it was a niche viewpoint 7 years ago (which I would quibble with, given third gender and trans people have existed for millennia across many cultures, just not commonly in modern America), then great, we've seen science advance. We used to think that being gay was a mental disease. We now recognize it as something that many animals have as a part of their population, including humans. 20 years ago, being gay was like, pretty much not accepted in public and the science was developing. Trans identities are coming a bit later, but we're still learning and developing our models.
      • woooooo 4y ago
        I am all about being nice to people who live their lives however, but the idea of "gender" as a fluid philosophical concept distinct from sex is super squishy. It's massively overstating things to call it "settled science" or even "science" at this point. It's philosophy in theory and public opinion in practice. Science: this phenomenon exists and people exist who've had these experiences. That's a factual statement. Politics: you must talk and think about the phenomenon in these proscribed ways. That's an ideological statement.
        • socialismisok 4y ago
          When I talk about fluidity of gender, or gender distinct from sex, I start with well accepted terms. Consider: you would probably agree with me that a butch tomboy and a valley girl fashionista are both women. But they represent different extremes on what we, socially, agree femininity is. We might say the butch woman is less feminine than the valley girl. Likewise, we'd typically say Clint Eastwood is more manly than, say, Bill Gates. A similar spread of "manliness" for men. If we're on the same page so far, we're comfortable with the idea that gender has a spectrum - two separate spectrums, one for men and one for women. I don't need you to agree that they intersect at all, just that the concept of "manliness" and "femininity" are not single points in their respective genders. Now let's look globally. Are the same spectrums universal? In the Middle East, east Asia, Russia, central Africa, and Polynesia... Does feminity look the same? I'd argue no. A hijab or niqab might evoke feminity in some parts of the world but not in others. Following this, there must be a social component to feminity and manliness. And this component is not genetic. So there must be "something" that exists that's a social construct related to sex. What should we call this social construct, assuming we agree there is no chromosomal need to wear a niqab? Academically, gender has evolved to be the word that describes the cultural expectations placed on men and women. These expectations allow for some flexibility for culture and personality. If you are comfortable with this so far, and we can agree on the above, I'm happy to dive into the fluidity, non-binary, and forget separation of gender and sex as a follow on discussion. But if we disagree about the above, we should sort that before moving on.
  • flippinburgers 4y ago
    Ahh yes the good ol' let me talk down on someone with their "elementary" level of knowledge is always a great way to start a "good faith discussion". EDIT: Intersex does not turn the male/female binary into a "spectrum".
    • socialismisok 4y ago
      I didn't talk down. Genuinely, high school biology teaches us that there are two sexes XX it's a woman, XY it's a man. That's literally what we learn. It's only after you dive into the science at a collegiate level or higher that you learn there's a small percentage, maybe 1-2% of people, for whom this binary understanding is not a good model. I'm not saying it's bad to only have a high school understanding, just that it's an incomplete understanding.
      • AnimalMuppet 4y ago
        You may not have intended to talk down. But it came across that way...
        • socialismisok 4y ago
          Apologies! Text is difficult. If I did a poor job, I'm open to suggestions on how I could have rephrased (and if I can still edit the post, I'll try to do so).
          • AnimalMuppet 4y ago
            It wasn't so much the words - the words were fine. It's the assumption that "I know real biology, and you must not".
            • socialismisok 4y ago
              That's fair, but if you tell me there's a simple biological definition of sex, odds are pretty good you have a relatively simple model.
  • commandlinefan 4y ago
    The only real discussion to be had is that you and I mean (very) different things when we use the word "woman".
    • socialismisok 4y ago
      For sure. I've had this discussion many times with many people. I'd argue that most women, in fact probably 99% or more, fall into a fairly straightforward definition - two X chromosomes, raised to behave like whatever their society expects from women. (I think we can agree that "woman" might have different cultural/social expectations depending on where they were raised? E.g. in some parts of the world a niqab or hajib is expected, for instance.) But there exists a small group of people who don't fit in with that definition. They might have been born with a penis but two XX chromosomes, they might have been born without functional ovaries or an abnormal set of genitalia. They might have been born with XY chromosomes but never developed a penis. These folks are intersex, and are often raised as women. I would say, in these cases, that we might agree that they are women - their chromosomes might not always be XX, but all their features and body development and social upbringing in the world suggests that they are women. Then we come to another group. A group whose bodies are functionally male but who feel a deep revulsion at being a man. But before we dive in to that case, are you comfortable with the other two cases and have any disagreements about the 99% or intersex cases?
      • oska 4y ago
        You're using intersex ppl and the very real issues they have faced to then push gender ideology (your transition at the end to "A group whose bodies are functionally male but who feel a deep revulsion at being a man"). That's exploitative of intersex people but is sadly consistent with gender ideologues always trying to piggyback on other group's issues (e.g. the attempt to piggbyback on the struggles that same sex attracted people have faced).
        • socialismisok 4y ago
          I'm starting a discussion about the definition of women and men, first by discussing cis people, then introducing the idea that the simple label doesn't always apply, and if there is agreement, I planned to discuss trans and non binary identities. The goal is to explain that it is not as simple as XX or XY, not to say trans and intersex people face the same challenges.
  • tomp 4y ago
    Not really, no. Sex, scientifically, is determined by the kind of gametes an organism produces in sexual maturity. Males produce small sex cells, females produce large sex cells. There is no overlap among mammals (i.e. human sex is “binary”) Gender is a concept made up by feminists with no consistent definition, use mainly to confuse.
    • socialismisok 4y ago
      What about humans who produce no gametes? Are they sexless?
      • tomp 4y ago
        Yes. For organisms that aren't capable of sexual reproduction, it doesn't make sense to talk about sex.
        • socialismisok 4y ago
          So if these humans were raised as men or women, we should stop calling them that and... Use non gendered pronouns like it or they? Which restrooms should they use?
      • xigoi 4y ago
        Those usually still have most of the body features for producing certain gametes, they just aren't functioning.
    • lemmiwinks 4y ago
      If you think gender is confusing, maybe you should consider that the problem is *you*?
  • monkmartinez 4y ago
    Do it. Are there peer reviewed papers or something on Arvix that explicitly dive into the "beyond high school level of biology" where sex is not defined at the cellular level (wrt Autosomes)? I am not interested in debating the sociological version, to be perfectly honest.
    • socialismisok 4y ago
      It's important to remember we're discussing the margins. The XX, XY definition is functionally good enough for nearly all cases. But there exist people whose sex doesn't work into that model. Consider some 46 XX intersex people. In these cases, outside conditions (typically an endocrine imbalance in the mother) leads to the development of a penis, and the loss of a vagina. These children may be raised as boys. Similarly, some XY people are born with autosomal defects that prevent them from effectively processing testosterone into dihydrotestosterone. As a result, their bodies develop into what we would consider typically female. They are often raised as girls. There are dozens of conditions similar to these. "XX male syndrome" might be one example of specifically what you are looking for - people who are scientifically discussed as male despite having XX chromosomes, a typically female karotype. It can be caused by autosomal origins Ultimately, we cannot remove the discussion of sociological science from biology, because we make choices for kids in these cases. And those choices differ depending on culture. The US preferentially gives intersex people male gender, while Saudi Arabia does the opposite, even for the same conditions. In this way, even biological sex has some social component.
• xadhominemx 4y ago
  They don’t have the right to say hateful things about someone on someone else’s platform. They had a privilege, which was conditionally revoked.
  • dmix 4y ago
    Like satirists posting pictures of Muhammad?
    • xadhominemx 4y ago
      If Twitter was the government of the United States and subject to first amendment restrictions, you would have a point.
  • memish 4y ago
    Saying "the Earth is round" is hateful from the perspective of flat earthers. Would you apply the same logic equally and make it an offense to satirize this particular belief? Or to bring it full circle, I doubt the Bee would petition to get someone banned for satirizing "God" or saying "God is not real". If they did, we would call it out too.
    • xadhominemx 4y ago
      Yes, obviously Twitter got to decide which hateful statements were prohibited and which were not.
      • dmix 4y ago
        You can trust Twitter and activists to make those decisions all you like. But don't expect people to stand by and accept that as an acceptable solution to societies problems. Because you're making these zero-transparency and zero-due process systems fill this role. Which is naive and idealistic in the worst ways. I would probably believe in these exact things when I was an ill-formed and very socially concerned 16 year old, but I can't honestly take that position today. The only people I see taking this position are people willing to gamble for today for short term gains of their pet ideologies while ignoring long term harm.
• Shared404 4y ago
  > The 'mis-gendering' in this case was absolutely truthful in a scientific sense, Except: A) Gender != biological sex. B) Even biological sex has a lot more shades of grey C) Even if the Bee were referring to biological sex, it would be Male/Female of the year, not Man/Woman. D) It's the Bee. Everyone knows the intent.
  • xigoi 4y ago
    > A) Gender != biological sex. What makes you thing they weren't talking about biological sex? > B) Even biological sex has a lot more shades of grey Which are not applicable in this case, since the sex of the individial in question is inambiguous. C) Even if the Bee were referring to biological sex, it would be Male/Female of the year, not Man/Woman. A man is defined as an adult male. > D) It's the Bee. Everyone knows the intent. Yes, the intent of satire is to make fun of absurd situations.
    • socialismisok 4y ago
      Language is moving towards a disambiguation between male (as a kerotype or body plan) and man (as a social concept of what it is to be 'manly' in that society.) This evolution of language has been very rapid in some circles, and slow in others, but everyone uses it to some degree. For example, when people say, "Be a man!" Or "man up!", they aren't saying, "show your adult male body". They are saying, "meet our standards for what a man in our culture is!" Mulan's famous song, "I'll make a man out of you" has nothing to do with chromosomes or penises. It has everything to do with the social side of the term "man". So at the very least, the word man is ambiguous and could mean adult male or it could mean someone who is manly in behavior.
      • xigoi 4y ago
        > Language is moving towards a disambiguation between male (as a kerotype or body plan) and man (as a social concept of what it is to be 'manly' in that society.) No, some people are artificially trying to create this distinction. In normal speech, “man” and “male” are pretty much interchangeable. > For example, when people say, "Be a man!" Or "man up!", they aren't saying, "show your adult male body". They're saying “show properties that are traditionally associated with males”. These stereotypes have to place in modern society and I find it appalling that the people who claim to want equality are continuing to perpetuate them.