For fuck's sake.

[Losty]

Why are the majority of users'' "gender" status in their bio still showing "undisclosed"?
...

It is totally irrelevant to most things that are posted.  You frankly do not need to know, in almost all cases.

I am reminded of something my wife told me.  In her youth, she communicated with people on message boards.  In those days, it was mostly men who did such things.  Since they could not see her, they did not know she was a young girl, and she was treated quite differently than how she was treated in real life.  If she had said she was a young girl, people would not have taken her as seriously as they did.  They communicated with her like an equal.  She found the experience interesting.

So, I recommend that everyone select a gender neutral name (or one that might be taken as gender neutral), and not tell people what one's gender is, unless it is relevant to a specific point, and then only mention it at the time, rather than put it in one's description.

Anyone who believes sexism no longer exists, is an idiot.  In fact, so much of an idiot, that I do not even want to waste any time arguing with such a braindead moron.


So, I, for one, will not put in a gender designation.  I will only do so if one were required by the site.  And given the options that are available here, I would then select "Other."

Really, do you need to know what my genitals are like in order to evaluate my posts?  (Or what I consider my genitals to be, or wish they were, or any other goddamned thing about genitals and how one feels about them?)  Will it make what I state better or worse due to my genitals?  What could possibly be more irrelevant to know?


But I do thank you for bringing up this topic, and I think I may make a suggestion to those who run this site to remove the gender designation entirely.


Edited to add:

http://atheistforums.org/thread-33372.html

I think you're over thinking it. The vast majority of active people here consider each other friends. This place is more like a family than a "messaging board" and people here tend to respect each other based on merit rather than gender or age. Sure there are people who are most comfortable being a sentient avatar and that's their choice, but I like to let things get a tiny bit personal. I like to get to know people here. 

That being said, I have no idea what my profile gender is. I'm still struggling with not having a mobile version to post from. If you don't know my gender yet, stick around it won't take long to figure out.