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Some countries in Eastern Europe actively opposes gender stuff (it is banned in education). I do not know why "gender" is being asked in the first place, it sho
by johnisgood 2y ago
Some countries in Eastern Europe actively opposes gender stuff (it is banned in education). I do not know why "gender" is being asked in the first place, it should be "sex", and that is biological. Why do we ask for gender on websites, for example? What is the purpose of it, really?
- ben_w 2y ago> Why do we ask for gender on websites, for example? What is the purpose of it, really? I can only think of two reasons: 1) Localised messages to and from the user. Not every language supports gender-neutral singular "you/they". 2) Demographic tracking e.g. for advertising: I've been given unskippable ads on YouTube for sanitary pads, and have forgotten which ad network presented me with one for dick pills.
- johnisgood 2y agoHmm, are you sure about the localized messages? They typically use 'you' instead of third-person pronouns like 'he' or 'she.'
- ben_w 2y ago85% sure: the claim here was that there are some languages where "you" itself comes in masculine and feminine forms. I'm told this applies to Hebrew and Arabic — אתה and את — but my ability to confirm this is limited to googling wiktionary. 85% is mainly how much I trust the sources: my experience has been kind of factoid is often true, but sometimes turns out to be "this source sounds like it means X, but actually it means Y" or worse "we made it up and you'll never check". That said, I ought to have written "I can only think of two *good* reasons", because the third reason is "whenever anyone makes a database of people, we automatically add gender without even thinking about it".
- johnisgood 2y agoWouldn't asking for "sex" suffice though? What happens when someone picks "none of the above" or "prefer not to answer"?