Transexuals

[FatAndFaithless]

And what does that mean?

[Neo-Scholastic]

delete double post

[FatAndFaithless]

Or hey, we could just be dealing with a topic that we previously thought had a high degree of 'clarity', but in reality is far more complex and nuanced. We're struggling to address this newly recognized complexity with terms that many people still view from an older (I'd use the word 'outdated') standpoint, so of course there is going to be some disagreement and confusion while we figure this stuff out. Just because this issue is new to many, many people and that we're stuck using old verbiage until we can agree on new terms (IF we agree new terms are needed at all), doesn't mean there's anything inherently wrong with the lack of 'clarity' we currently see.

Clarity about very complex issues is hard to come by. Who knew.

[abaris]

Abaris and FNF, you both completely missed the point. Everyone knows that language is dynamic. The issue at hand is whether the terms being used contribute to clarity or undermine it.

Language is a means of expressing oneself. And that tells a lot about society and the person using certain terms. It's the willingness to learn what our world and our knowledge has to offer what makes our language evolve.

[Neo-Scholastic]

And what does that mean?

Your implied criticism of my earlier post was misguided. I do object to organic shifts in the meaning of words. That's basic linguistics. Instead, I gave two examples of purposeful changes in our understanding of words used to describe sex and gender.

The first example was from critical theory in which sex and gender were to no longer considered synonyms. In that body of literature, sex is a natural feature of some plants and animals while gender is socially constructed. This distinction was popularized in the 1980's and 1990's. I applauded this change because it made it easier to talk constructively about many issues, from fashion to public policy.

The second example discards any notion that sex refers to any natural and objective feature of some living creatures. Both sex and gender are not even social constructs; but rather, personal subjective beliefs. I think purposefully changing the meaning of the terms in such a way reduces clarity. At best it only causes confusion, at worst it gives rise to unnecessary unintentional offence.

[The Grand Nudger]

Good to know the issue at hand is a word clarity issue, because for a minute...I thought that we might be talking about a civil rights issue. Fight the good fight for linguistic conservatism, gl.

[Faith No More]

Your misunderstanding, Chad, comes in believing that gender identity is a subjective belief.  We now know that not only do a person's genitals determine their sex, so does the structure of their brains.  We know that in the development of a fetus, the sex of the brain and the sex of the genitals are determined at different times, and sometimes the two do not line up.  So, a transgender person is simply someone with the brain of one sex, but the genitals of another.  It's not as if they just choose to identify as the sex opposite of their genitals.  It's that their brains are literally telling them that their sex is different than their genitals, and they choose to identify with what their brain tells them as opposed to what's physically between their legs.

[Wyrd of Gawd]

This Woman Says She Was Called "Disgusting" After Being Mistaken for Transgender in Walmart Bathroom

A video posted by a Connecticut woman named Aimee Toms is making headlines, after she says a stranger verbally attacked her inside a Walmart bathroom on Friday after mistaking her for being transgender.

"What these 'bathroom bills' are actually about is enforcing traditional gender codes and norms in an increasingly diverse and shifting America," Sally Kohn recently wrote in an editorial for TIME. "Single-sex restrooms just like single-sex dormitories have always been rooted in compulsory heteronormativity and the sense that we have to protect women from men who can’t expect to be reigned in."

That story is most likely pure BS.  

1.  There were no witnesses. 

2.  She claims that she was previously accosted by a guy in a women's restroom who tried to rape her.

3.  She recently wrote an article about the issue.

She's either having a run of bad luck or else she's lying her ass off.

[The Grand Nudger]

 they choose to identify with what their brain tells them as opposed to what's physically between their legs.

As I would have continued to consider myself a man had I not been wearing a kevlar cup, and stood before you dickless today, lol. I'd get pissed if things went south...and then I was forced to use the little girls room because I didn't have the right dangling bits. Probably about as pissed as a woman who was forced to use the mens room..because she just so happened to have a penis, or once had a penis.

I'm not even sure why any of it is relevant, I doubt that many of us have segregated bathrooms at home. We've all taken a piss or a shower with someone of the opposite sex in vicinity. Most of us have probably, at some time..even used the "wrong" public restroom. My girls go to the mens room when I take them out. My boys go to the womens room when my wife takes them out. They all go to -any- available bathroom when they're about to piss their pants regardless of who's watching them...and if, by chance, the womens room was where me and my boys found ourselves..and there was a complaint...I'd probably just ask the woman in question if -she- wanted to hold my sons unit, or wipe his ass.

Pissing, not peeping......but one predictable segment of our society has completely forgotten that.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Your misunderstanding, Chad, comes in believing that gender identity is a subjective belief.

&

We know that in the development of a fetus, the sex of the brain and the sex of the genitals are determined at different times, and sometimes the two do not line up. So, a transgender person is simply someone with the brain of one sex, but the genitals of another.

Perhaps my confusion stems from inconsistent definitions of sex/gender and the simplistic notions about identity being presented. Many parts of identity are acquired by experience and reflection, others are innate biological features, and some are social constructs imposed on us. As an analogy, the form of a vessel may determine how many ounces of fluid it can hold but it does not determine what someone will put in it. Likewise the same vessel in one cultural context may suggest “coffee cup” and in another suggest “pen holder.”

It's not as if they just choose to identify as the sex opposite of their genitals. It's that their brains are literally telling them that their sex is different than their genitals, and they choose to identify with what their brain tells them as opposed to what's physically between their legs.

What you wrote seems to me like a jumble of concepts that draws on mutually exclusive assumptions about the relationship between brain states versus mental properties, cultural attitudes about masculinity versus femininity, and subjective experience versus objective reality.