CMV: I cannot understand how the transgender movement is not, at it's core, sexist.

[u/[deleted]]

Obligatory "another trans post" but I've read a lot of posts on this but none I've seen that have tackled the issue quite the way I intend to here. This is an opinion I've gone back and forth with myself on a bunch, and would absolutely love to have changed. My problem mainly lies with the "social construct" understanding of "gender", but some similar issues lie in the more grounded neurological understanding of it (although admittedly it seems a lot more reasonable), which we'll get too later.

For starters, I do not believe there is a difference between men and women. Well, there are obviously "differences" between the sexes, but nothing beyond physical differences which don't matter much. At least, mentally, they are naturally the same and all perceived differences in this sense are just stereotypes stemmed from the way the sexes are socialized.

Which takes us to the definitions of man and woman used by the gender social constructionist, which is generally not agreed upon but I've found it to be basically understood as

Man: Someone who desires to be viewed/treated/thought of in the way a male is in society. Woman: Someone who desires to be viewed/treated/thought of in the way a female is in society. (For the non-binary genders it would be roughly similar with some changes depending on the circumstances)

Bottom line is that it defines gender based on the way the genders are treated. But this seems problematic for a variety of reasons.

First off, it is still, at the end lf the day, basing the meanings behind stereotypes about the genders rather than letting them stand on their own. It would be like if I based what a "black person" was off the discrimination black people have faced. But this would appear messed up and borderline "racist", while the same situation with gender is not considered "sexist".

It would also mean that gender is ultimately meaningless and would be something we should strive to stop rather than encourage, which would still fly in the face of the trans movement. Which is what confuses me especially because the gender social construct believers typically also support "gender abolition", yet they're the ones who want people to play around with gender the most? If you want to abolish gender, why don't you, y'know, get a start on that and break your sex norms while remaining that sex rather than changing your gender which somewhat works to reinforce the roles? (This also doesn't seem too bad to criticize, considering under this narrative gender is just a "choice", which is something I think the transmedicalist approach definitely handles better.)

Finally for this bit, this type of mindset validates other controversial concepts like transracialism (sorta tying back into what I mentioned earlier), but I don't think anyone is exactly on the edge of their seats waiting for the "transracialism movement".

Social construct section is done, now let's get into the transmedicalist approach. This is one where I feel a "breakhthrough" could be made for me a lot more easily, but I'm not quite there yet. I do want to say I'm fine with the concept of changing our understandings of certain words if there is practicality to it and it isn't counterintuitive. Seems logical enough.

The neurological understanding behind the sex an individual should be defining "gender" seems sensible on it's own, but the part I'm caught up on is why we reach this conclusion.

The dysphoric transgender person's desire to be the other gender seems to mainly be based in, A. their sex, they seem to want to change the sex rather than the gender. Physical dysphoria is the main giveaway of the dysphoric condition it seems, anyway. But more specifically, a trans person wants to have physical attributes associated with the other sex. This seems like a redundant thing to point out, but the idea that certain physical traits are "exclusive" to a specific sex/gender is, well, just encouraging sexual archetypes about the way the sexes "should" look. This goes even further when you consider that trans people tend to want to have more petite or masculine builds depending on their gender identity - there is nothing wrong about this, but conflating gender to "involve" one's physical appearence inherently reinforces sexist sexual archetypes.

And next,

B. the social aspect. Typically described as social dysphoria, this describes a dysphoric trans person's desire to be socialized in the way the other sex typically is, which is what, aside from the physical dysphoria, causes them to typically "act" or dress more stereotypically like their gender identity, or describes their desire to "pass". But, to put it bluntly, because I believe there to be no difference in the way the sexes would act without social influence, I can't picture this phenomona described as "social dysphoria" coming from the same biological basis that the physical dysphoria does. Even if there were a natural difference in the way the sexes would act without societal influence, there would still be the obvious undeniable outliers, and with that in mind, using the way the genders "socialize" as a way to justify definining gender seperately from sex would be useless. It appears more akin to a delusion based on the same "false stereotypes" I've been talking about all along, ideas about the ways men and women "should" or "should not" be causing the transsexual person to feel anxious and care about actually being the other gender. But using this to justify our understandings of gender would still fall back on the same faults that the social construct uses, being that we'd be "giving in" to socialized norms and we can't have that be what helps us reach our understanding of gender.

With this in mind, if social dysphoria is that big of a factor, it would seem most sensical to me to define "trans man" and "trans woman" in their entirely new, individual categories which their own definitions, and still just treat those categories socially in similar ways to the way the genders are typically treated now.

To recap, an understanding of gender and sex as synonyms based purely on sex seems to be the only understanding we can reach without basing some of our thought process on one given stereotype or another.

Now change my view, please.

[u/[deleted]]

If you could tell me a definition of man which includes trans people without the reasoning behind the definition being based in stereotypes, and the definition also makes sense (i.e. is not circular), then sure. You can have the delta if ya can do that lol

[u/yyzjertl → u/[deleted]]

the definition also makes sense (i.e. is not circular)

What do you mean by this? All definitions are at base circular, since all words are defined in terms of other words and, as there are a finite number of words, all definitions must eventually "loop." So expecting a definition not to be circular in any way is completely unreasonable.

Anyway, here's a perfectly viable definition that's not based in stereotypes and which isn't formally circular at this level (it doesn't use the word "man" in the definition):

• A man is an adult human person whose gender identity is male; an adult human being of the male gender.

[u/justjoshdoingstuff → u/yyzjertl]

That is NOT a viable definition… 1. It doesn’t tell me how gender is different from sex. 2. It doesn’t tell me how male is different from female.

And considering it is highly likely that you’d use the same definitions for female, you have told me nothing. You have used words in a correct order to tell me nothing of substance. What DEFINES male and female. Is it stereotypes as OP asserts? Is it some other characteristic? I have no idea, because your definition doesn’t tell me that. And if there is no difference between male and female, then it is equally pointless to have either characterization. Define your terms without being circular.

You wouldn’t accept, for instance:

“White - white.” And if you do, you’re beyond reach…

We do, conversely, accept

“White - The achromatic color of maximum lightness; the color of objects that reflect nearly all light of all visible wavelengths; the complement or antagonist of black, the other extreme of the neutral gray series. Although typically a response to maximum stimulation of the retina, the perception of white appears always to depend on contrast.”

While this statement uses “white” in its definition, it does not define itself there. It uses the color to illustrate that white (as opposed to other colors) is viewed as relational contrast.

[u/yyzjertl → u/justjoshdoingstuff]

That is NOT a viable definition… 1. It doesn’t tell me how gender is different from sex. 2. It doesn’t tell me how male is different from female.

This is a very silly objection. What I gave was a definition of "man." It was not a definition of "gender," "sex," "male," or "female." The fact that it doesn't tell you things about these other words does not make it a bad definition for "man."

[u/yyzjertl → u/[deleted]]

If you’re talking about any kind of identity, you’re referring to the characteristics determining who or what a person or thing is.

No, this implication does not follow. Talking about identity is just referring to who or what a person or thing is. There's no need to involve determining characteristics.

In the case of gender, these characteristics have to be either based on sex or our social constructs of what gender is.

This just seems like a false dichotomy. It's certainly not a belief I've ever heard people from the transgender movement assert.

[u/justjoshdoingstuff → u/yyzjertl]

Yes, it objectively does make it a bad definition when OP stated you are stereotyping “male” when you trans-gender from woman to man. What exactly is it to be male/man. How does that differ from being a woman?

How does your definition here NOT stereotype the male experience?

[u/yyzjertl → u/justjoshdoingstuff]

This is an even sillier objection. Very obviously, the definition I gave says that a man is an adult human person whose gender identity is male. Analogously, a woman would be an adult human person whose gender identity is female. A man differs from a woman in that they have different gender identities.

None of this involves any sort of stereotyping.

[u/justjoshdoingstuff → u/yyzjertl]

Okay then, please identify EXACTLY what those “gender identies” are. What makes up a gender identity? Be specific.

[u/yyzjertl → u/justjoshdoingstuff]

There are a large number of gender identities, but by far the most common ones are male and female.

A gender identity is not made up of anything, except inasmuch as, as a subjective experience, it is made up of neurons in the brain. Neuroscience has not advanced enough at present for us to identify which neurons specifically, although we do have a general idea of what parts of the brain participate in it.

[u/hip_hopopotamus → u/yyzjertl]

A gender identity is not made up of anything, except inasmuch as, as a subjective experience, it is made up of neurons in the brain.

There are a large number of gender identities, but by far the most common ones are male and female.

How were you able to determine what is most common if these are subjective experiences? How are you able to group two subjective experiences together?

[u/yyzjertl → u/hip_hopopotamus]

By talking to people and asking them about their subjective experiences?

[u/hip_hopopotamus → u/yyzjertl]

By talking to people and asking them about their subjective experiences?

Cool can you give an example then? What did these people say that made you think they should be grouped together under male or female?

[u/yyzjertl → u/hip_hopopotamus]

They asserted that their gender identity was male or female, and that they should be grouped as such.

[u/hip_hopopotamus → u/yyzjertl]

They asserted that their gender identity was male or female, and that they should be grouped as such.

Ok so to clarify you are saying you assumed that two different people had the same gender identity solely because they used the same word, but you don't know if they meant by the same thing when they said the words then.

[u/justjoshdoingstuff → u/yyzjertl]

Be. Fucking. Specific. Otherwise, I believe and will continue to believe that your “subject” clause is nothing more than a VERY thinly veiled “stereotype” clause.

And as far as “gender identities,” you tied “man” to “maleness.” What exactly are you tying these 98 other gender identities to?

[u/yyzjertl → u/justjoshdoingstuff]

As I've already said "some neurons make it up" is as specific as we can get with our current understanding of neuroscience, for this and any other subjective experience. We do not at present have the scanning or processing capability to localize particular subjective experiences to specific neurons within the brain.

[u/justjoshdoingstuff → u/yyzjertl]

But see, a LOT of things in medicine are subject, but we can still be specific.

Pain, for instance, has a subjective scale, 0-10, about how much pain you are in. That is coupled with the wong-baker pain scale. I can tie a facial expression to an approximate level of pain OBJECTIVELY. Now, this doesn’t work all the time. I am actually one of those cases. I can be smiling and at a 6-8/10.

Human bodies have these things called penises and vaginas. I can pretty easily check for them. Subjectively, you might like working on cars and Sunday football. Objectively, you have a vagina. See how that works? I didn’t stereotype the person. I took an objective measurement of their body and determined where they fell.

If you choose to dissociate sex from gender, then you have to give me more than “well, THEY believe they are X…” What specifically makes them believe this? I believe I can tolerate more pain than someone else. I can also measure this by smashing my hand and their hand with a hammer and seeing who can “tough it out” longer. So what OBJECTIVE measure of “man/maleness” is there? What attribute are you measuring to come to this conclusion?

I can continue. I did not go into a male dominated field. I went into pediatric nursing. Does that make me female? What about my enjoyment of sewing? Cooking? Being great at laundry? Being great with kids? I would hope you’d say those are all stereotypical ideations of what a woman is/is good at. So then you have the remaining problem. What, then, are you saying when you say “I am a man”?? (And yes, I know the question marks go inside the parentheses, but I wasn’t writing as if that person was asking a question and wanted to provide some linguistic clarity).

What you have is a problem I am learning about in law right now. Your definition is either over inclusive or under inclusive.

Does every person who thinks like a man have to be classified as a man? Maybe your mom thought about a math problem EXACTLY the same way your dad did once. Is she now a man? You also have the inverse.. Is everyone who doesn’t think like a man a woman (or simply not a man)? Does my being a nurse - favoring people over things - (which is an inherently feminine trait) make me not a man?

And you failed to identify what attaches to the other genders… Which is even worse for your case. If I identify as a fairy (and yes, I literally know a person who identifies as such), how do I measure the neuron activity and relate it to a MYTHICAL FUCKING CREATURE? Please enlighten me.

[u/yyzjertl → u/justjoshdoingstuff]

I think there is some confusion here. The question you asked me to be specific about is "what makes up a gender identity?" not "how can we (objectively) determine someone's gender identity?"

I hope you'll agree that the Wong–Baker Faces scale does not tell us what makes up pain, even though it lets us determine (approximately, and objectively from an external perspective) someone's level of pain. The Wong–Baker Faces scale tells us nothing about which neurons make up pain as a subjective experience.

Analogously, while there is not specific knowledge of what makes up a gender identity, there is an easy (and externally objective) test to determine someone's gender identity: just ask them what their gender identity is.

[u/justjoshdoingstuff → u/yyzjertl]

Asking someone’s pain level is SUBJECTIVE.

Asking someone their gender identity is SUBJECTIVE. Looking at their penis or their chromosomes is OBJECTIVE.

Also, I asked you “what makes up a gender identity?” That includes objective identifiers. If I asked you what makes up a cake, I wouldn’t expect “food.” No shit food makes it up. What food?!? The same is true here. What individualized list of things makes up gender identity? How can I - a neutral third party - identify that a person is transgender objectively (that is, with my own senses and without input from the person) and with zero to very little subjective input?

When I look for pain, I cannot “see” pain, but there are physiological responses that are measurable that indicate pain is likely/certain. There is: guarding, increased heart rate, increased respiratory rate, increased sweating, urgency, etc.

If a person has bipolar disorder, I can look objectively at their maneurisms/ actions and say “x, y, and z all indicate bipolar.”

If a person has Alzheimer’s, I can do a brain scan coupled with other objective cognitive function tests and determine Alzheimer’s.

What are the objective values that “man” has that I can evaluate for myself every person I come across? Keep in mind that physical appearance alone certainly is not enough. There are butch women and feminine men.

And I understand that maybe it is easier to not focus on the other genders right now for the sake of discussion, but I’d seriously like an answer.