this post was submitted on 10 Jan 2025
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You've never gendered someone wrong before? Never seen a boy with long hair and called him a girl by accident? Never got someone's gender wrong because of how they looked? Do you interact socially with other people very often?
But I'll ask again. Every time you talk about another person, either directly or indirectly, do you demand to see biological evidence of past or present pregnancy, or the ability to become pregnant, before you can agree they are a girl or a woman? If the answer to that question is no, then how do you know that they are a girl or woman? What is it that tells you that? What are you assessing that tells you that they are a girl or woman?
No I’ve never gendered someone wrong. Pretty easy thing to differentiate
Haha, I don't believe that for a second. Whether you have or not doesn't matter, because it happens all the time. And as someone who was an androgynous kid I got called a girl all the time. I certainly didn't do anything to dissuade that. People used to ask my mom who her little sister was cause my mom was a young mother. And she'd have to awkwardly correct them both on the fact that I was her child and that I was a boy.
Are you going to actually respond to the rest of that comment though? Come on, let's see some reading comprehension skills and critical thinking. Defend your views.
No I don’t ask those questions. I can see that they are a boy or a girl. You make it sound like it’s a complex thing. It’s not.
I am absolutely not the one making it sound like a complex thing haha you're the one who brought up pregnancy as though that's how we determine how to gender someone.
Perfect, so you agree that how someone looks to you is how you gender them. It isn't their ability to reproduce, it isn't their chromosomes, it isn't their genitalia, it's how they look. Like someone might be wearing clothes considered feminine in your culture, they might be wearing makeup or have visible breasts or a frame or facial structure associated with femininity in your culture. They might carry themselves in a way considered feminine by your culture, have a voice in a higher range or speak in a cadence and tone associated with femininity by your culture.
You would be inclined to gender that person a woman and use pronouns she and her for them. Pretty simple right, you've seen girls your whole life you know what they look like. You know how they talk how they move what they wear. Same with boys. You know the way boys look and how they move and talk, what clothes they wear, how their hair is cut, how they're built and what their faces look like.
But you'll note that none of these things are hard-line biological rules. Women are still women without breasts, with deep voices, with squarer builds and heavier facial structures. Women are still women with facial hair from PCOS. Womanhood is not something determined by biology. Otherwise, you'd ask for concrete proof every single time you had to refer to someone. It also exists whether or not someone completely matches what you expect women to look like or not. And if you gender a cisgender person wrong, if you call a girl a boy, she can correct you, and you will apologize and refer to her as a girl. She looked like a boy to you from that angle, but you were wrong.
Gender is a social class. It is how we treat people socially. It defines certain rules and conventions for how you think about someone and how you interact with them. Transgender rights is liberating people to determine what their own gender is. It's allowing gender identity to be self determined instead of assumed by other people. It's pointing out, correctly, that gender is not defined by biology. It is defined by convention by what other people call you. That men and women are not biologically hardwired towards gender. Dresses are not a part of women's biology, nor long hair, nor push-up bras. Those things are culturally and socially determined. Assigned gender is defined by restriction, boys can't do that girls can't do this. Liberating people from assigned gender allows them to define who they are.
In short, gender is something you assign by what you see. What you see can be wrong. And when it's wrong you trust the person speaking when they correct you (unless you're an asshole). This has always applied to cis people. But it is restrictive, it forces people to be and act a certain way even if they don't want to. And it doesn't have to be that way. Your gender should be up to you. Everyone's should be.
See that’s where we’re not seeing eye-to-eye
I see a dude/kid/teenager have long hair act feminine or vice versa
A person may be more masculine or feminine in whatever way. But you are still the gender/sex that you were born with. Whatever you do in life based on who you are that’s up to you! Cool you made yourself happy. But bottom line. You’re still a dude or a girl at birth.
In what way are you "a dude or a girl at birth" if "dude or girl" is something people decide by how you look and not by your biology? And how do you explain masculinity or femininity being culturally relative? Men hold hands and kiss each other on the cheeks in some cultures. Those expressions of affection are masculine, as are skirts and well manicured nails in other cultures. There are some culture where being thin and vain are considered masculine. And some cultures where being stocky and blunt are considered feminine.
Femininity and masculinity are 2 words that essentially mean "of men and women". It's just a roundabout way of referring to genders. A feminine man is gender non-conforming, their femininity goes against their assigned gender. They are presumed to be masculine because of their assigned gender, and therefore discouraged from being feminine. Allowing people to self determine their gender directly liberates them from this process.
If you're willing to allow someone like me to exist, someone with a vagina and estrogen and breasts who was nonetheless assigned male at birth, what functionally is preventing you from respecting my identity as a woman? Why is that unacceptable to you? What is being damaged by acknowledging my gender? Language isn't sacred, and I feel like I've more than pointed out already that the word woman is not determined by someone's biology. So what is the reason why you insist that society affirm and uphold the right of other people to tell me what gender I am? If it's not biology and it is restrictive, literally giving me rules for who I am and who I'm allowed to be and how people must treat me, like it's demonstrably severely damaging to my mental well-being, then why is it necessary for assigned gender to still be upheld? Why is it okay for you to continue to assert that about me? You disrespect me and my experiences when you continue to call me a man.
You also say that you're glad I made myself happy, but earlier said "9 more days ❤️". A clear attempt to make me feel threatened and unsafe because of political persecution at the hands of the upcoming change in presidency. If you're actually glad I myself happy, if it actually matters to you that I am healthy and have good quality of life, why do you promote support and endorse misinformation that is a direct threat to my safety? Why do you insist that society should take actions that would directly harm me? How can my well-being matter to you if in the same breath you disrespect my dignity as a person?
And sorry because I still would address as ma’am or ms.
But still in my head you are a man. You were born with a penis. Take the pills away and what happens?
I highly doubt you would agree that I'm a man if we met. Even if you could tell I was trans id still be willing to bet you wouldn't be able to internally conceive of me as a man. I am very conventionally feminine and dress and present myself in a way that is very in line with how other women my age dress and present.
I have had reassignment surgery, so nothing would happen if the pills were taken away. My body does not produce any more testosterone than a cisgender woman's does. Even if I hadnt had reassignment surgery, biology still isn't how we determine gender. My gender wouldn't change in the absence of medication.
Yeah okay buddy
I can't tell what you're responding to here. Are you saying you know how I look? I never said I was pretty, nor did I say that you definitely wouldn't be able to tell i was trans. I said that actually speaking with and interacting with me I feel you'd have a hard time conceiving of me as a man. I do not fall in line with western masculinity in really any way. I'm also very confident in my identity. You calling me a man doesn't make me feel uncomfortable, just disrespected.
A penis or vagina at birth.
You should respond more to what I said there. I added more at the end. Actually try and respond to what I'm saying. If your position is defensible and you are competent at defending it then prove it.
We already established that gender is not determined by biology. We determined that a dozen times over at this point. You assign gender based on what you see, and it's up to people to correct you if you got it wrong. This works fine when the person is cisgender, but you have decided is unacceptable when they're trans.
Just stop taking the pills and tell me what happens.
I used to be a very focused person and that’s who I thought I was. But know what happened? I stopped taking ADHD medication and Whataya know I wasn’t always so focused.
I also have ADHD. No argumentative points to that. I just thought I'd point that out.
As I said in my other comment, nothing, as I have had gender reassignment surgery. And even if I hadn't it wouldn't matter. My gender is not determined by my hormones.
Listen I got things to do and we’re not gonna see eye to eye. Good luck to ya
We're not going to see eye to eye because you won't consider my perspective. You've already decided that you're right and that I'm wrong before the conversation even starts. You're not open to the idea that maybe you aren't right about this. I'd ask you to consider that. Just open yourself to that one thing, that one possibility that maybe you're wrong about this. Consider that maybe you haven't thought of every possible challenge to your view of gender. I am absolutely willing to consider your perspective, and I feel I more than have throughout this conversation. Afford me the same dignity and treat my ideas as legitimate points worth considering. If you're definitely right and I'm definitely wrong, then considering my arguments shouldn't matter, right? Because if I'm wrong anyway, then my arguments shouldn't change that.
I don't think you're really a bad person. You said some shock value troll comments at the start of all this but then actually spent like 2 hours of your time talking with me. The good thing to do, the morally right thing to do, when faced with information that challenges our worldview, is to consider whether we are right or not.
Oh I’m gonna watch that video when I have some free time. Always try to consider and educate myself on the other side ya know
I think it's great that youre willing to engage with content that challenges you. I think that you should think about some of the stuff you said today. What if I was a kid, what if children read your comments. What you said was very damaging and made others feel unsafe. Not just like an insult but actually like the threat of insitutional violence against people for who they are. That's really serious. You shouldn't want to make people afraid that they will be harmed because of who they are.
Okay. I mean, you're not upsetting me by saying it. I'm a grown woman. Nice to know that you're indifferent to hurting children, though. By your own admission here.
I can see what your comment said in the notification. Even if you delete it. I responded like an hour later lol
Never once did I say “I’m okay with hurting children” If a parent is irresponsible enough to not teach child to let random opinions hurt that’s on them.
It wasn't an opinion, you gleefully referenced the upcoming administration in the US as it will handle trans people. You used the threat of institutional violence to try and make me afraid for my life and safety. Children could read those comments. That would do measureable harm to them. Those are horrible things to say. Your laissez faire attitude about it shows that you are in fact fine with hurting children.
I never once said anything that threatened your life.
I never said you did. You used the threat of violence from the change in power on January 20th to try and make me feel threatened and afraid. There's literally no other explanation for what you said. That's an awful thing to do to someone. Why are you even responding to me at this point if you're glad that the safety and well-being of other people like me is going to come under attack in a week? Isn't talking to me at all basically against the ideology of the people you support? They talk about my community like we're subhuman animals who should be put down for who we are. Because we're not the same as them and we don't conform with the expectations they enforce.
If you support attacks on my right to exist, my right to access healthcare and be a healthy person with quality of life, then I don't see why it would matter if you did or didn't literally threaten to hurt me.
I said that you were trying to make me feel threatened, not that I was.
Idk how you can call me living my life as normal "playing dress up". I've had reassignment surgery, I've been on hormones for a decade lmao. This is who I am, I'm not dishonestly presenting myself. Also, I thought it was totally cool for me to "be as masculine or as feminine" as I'd like, lmao. Guess you were lying about that.
Sad that it seemed like you were having half a second of self-awareness before losing it again. You don't seem very adept at critical thinking. Easier for you to try and insult me than actually consider anything I've said. I guess you prefer coming across as laughably incompetent as long as you can act like an insensitive douchebag. Oh well. It's not my job to educate you. Maybe consider vyvanse or some other stimulant medication, though, because you genuinely seem to have a hard time reading and following along with a conversation.
You never read it to begin with. If you're done then stop responding.
Bye
Gender is absolutely determined by biology. Remember I said I’ve never misgendered someone? You just chose not to believe a fact, remember?
I don't dispute the fact, I pointed out that I don't believe you. It's fine if that's true though, because i then shared my own experience of being mistaken for a girl many times as a child and teenager. I was assigned male at birth, so at the time saw myself as a boy and I think you'd agree at the time that I was. I still was called a girl all the time. When I corrected people, they accepted the correction.
I stated a lot more about how gender isn't biologically determined in the above. If you want to challenge individual points I've made, I'd like it if you could actually respond to those points. Instead of just blindly state that you're right despite all the challenges I've made that you haven't responded to.