Gender As A Social Construct

Not telling

 

You ignored all his questions.

 

I kinda wondered about that too, Asmo. I guess he's lost interest in the topic or maybe he went back to do research.

 

Is this thread about Caitlyn Jenner?

 

The usual miscommunication of terms in these types of arguments with the both of you. You have to define by what you mean by gender in the first place

He is talking about maculine vs feminine, just because a chic becomes a welder doesnt mean she has to be butch.

You are talking about hormone levels

Again, what are you actually talking about when you say gender.



Jordan Smith, the guy that won US's The Voice in 2015, obviously XXY, well obvious to those that know what to look for, or give a shot enough to pay attention

Grew up singing in the church, a fairly standard lifestyle, possibly totally unaware himself he is XXY, as many of them are.....but gets into adulthood, often mistaken for gay given certain female traits even though one of the symptoms is lack of interest in sex.

I use him as an example, as with him and ones like him, because how can it be a social construct if 99% of the population arent even paying attention enough to notice, and they themselves are unaware until well in to adulthood when certain health problems arise



Or put it another way, between Jordan Smith and Caitlyn Jenner, which guy is "more" transgender, the one that has a condition at the cellular level that gives him a lifetime of great skin (but also unfortunately likely a congenital heart condition) ,nobody even realises what he is and doesnt draw any attention to it.........or the guy that certainly wasnt struggling with gender dysphoria whilst pumping weights for the Olympics or most of his adult life, didnt "transistion" until after his stepdaughters got a hit reality TV show and pay packets and attention to boot




You maintain no one can better know their gender better than they themselves. Why do you want that to be true?

And its irrelevant what other people think? They are going to think whatever they want to think and there is nothing you can do about it

 

At first I thought you were telling my story, but then I realized I need to go back and think about this a bit because the learning disorder that came with the condition is holding me back. It appears to me that the person who is "more" transgender is the person who is likely not xxy.

 

Vanilla,

Your post got my attention real quick cause you mentioned Jordan Smith. I never herd of him before but I did a little search. I would never have pegged him for xxy, but I didn't look at any intro cause I don't normally watch the show.

When I talk about gender I'm talking about "male" or "female". And I do agree that males can be in feminine roles. When I was a male I worked in a field where there were no other guys. The townspeople couldn't understand how I could do it. Several years later I finally figured that one out. I wasn't a male.

What other ppl think of me isn't any of my business. I know that but sometimes they make it obvious.

xxy can be male, female, neither, or both genders. Most that I know of insist they are male.

Spring

 

Okay, so I'm xxy/xxxy. It's not male; it's not female. But I was assigned male at birth because I had a penis. I know more about my gender and conditions that come with it now than most medical personnel do. Research in this field is mostly being done regarding children and babies. My GP is willing to learn more about my condition from me than he knows from other sources. I want that to be true because I believe that more than two genders exist and I think that the general population should be aware of that.

And yes it is irrelevant what other people think. Most will believe me if I tell them about my life and my condition(s) and they enjoy hearing about my stories and my life but all that informational will not change "scientific fact".

So, being an intersex person, non-binary as it is often called, isn't going to be changed regardless if I have my penis removed and replaced, or if I take estrogen or testosterone. So the fact that I identify as a female doesn't mean that I transitioned or that I am a transsexual.

Spring

 

I don't know about gender (does it differ from the term sex in a biological way?) but gender roles are absolutely a social construct, though I do feel their basis is in biology.

 

In the past I think there was more gender roles. For example men have to work and they can not shave anything but their beard without being gay. Women stay at home and cook while being allowed to care for their body. But now it's easier for anyone to be anything. A lot of people still have issues with other's sexuality but those people are the minority. If they say you have "mental illness" you can just laugh it off because obviously they do not understand what that means. To get serious about any sex change you have to talk to mental health professionals. They will see what they need to.

The whole 60 pronouns on Facebook or whatever number it is confuses me though. Like I am all for people people whoever they want to me. Your soul is human and it has lived before so worry about happiness, love and not gender. But when you have 60 ways to be I think it's becoming more of a social clique than a real orientation.That is fine but I think it gives ammunition to people who who hate those lifestyles anyway. It's more of a reason for them to be a victim.

 

Going back to the original post.
I see the funny part of all this being that like most other animals, until Victorian times, men groomed and dressed to attract women.
Today, a women can spend a fortune on a dress and take hours on her hair and makeup, while her boyfriend thinks that it is OK to turn up with 2 days stubble and wearing ripped jeans.

 

It is funny, but not to me. I wouldn't think of dating a man. It's a different world from thirty years ago. Men don't treat women with the same respect that they did back then. In a man's world, they don't even notice the difference between the male and female genders. When I finally realized my preference, nobody else really cares. But I do.

 

Its a strange situation, where although men have broken from the traditions of things like opening doors for a woman, they do have more respect for their brainpower and personality. Equality at work has done a lot to help this, but like most things, their is always a downside. That Victorian era looks good on film, but would you like to live in a situation where you were treated like a china ornament, not expected to express a view at dinner and then sent off to play like a child while the men smoked their cigars and discussed the world. Perhaps it is difficult to retain hose traditional values when you see a woman turn up in a firetruck and carry the men out of the burning building. LOL.

I had an interesting conversation with a bar owner a few years ago about the way that men dress. It seems that the way that people dress at work is often a reversal of their social attire. He said that the men who came to the bar wearing the suits and ties were mostly builders and manual workers, While the guy wearing the tee shirt and ripped jeans was probably the bank manager.

We live in a strange world, but the one good point is that today people can be open about their preferences, rather than keeping a dark secret.
Our daughters partner is female and it has not affected her career in any way as a London police officer.

 

Biologically, obviously there are differences between males and females, but gender seems to serve as a social construct to influence political and social agendas. Many people seem to see gender as a way to be divisive...this is how patriarchy became a thing back in ancient times.

No matter how far equality between the genders has come, it’s still a patriarchal world.

 

I think I'd hedge the statement and say aspects of gender can be viewed as a social construct but ultimately I don't think gender is a social construct. This is not to say that gender roles are inherently immutable either, but I think the attribution of environmental changes that allow for fluctuations in gender roles are significantly under rated. Certain qualities we may generally attribute to gender might be considered a social construct but are likely derivative of aspects of gender that are more inherent.

To me there seems to be kind of an odd paradox with the whole gender identity thing, which is soon probably going to extending the 'appropriate' gender acronyms to longer than the alphabet. It's like the people who espouse this view, want to view the male and female gender as social constructs but want to view whatever gender they identify with as some immutable identity? I don't follow how they resolve this...

 

Men have made most important advancements in science. The three greatest ideas of the 20th century, relativity, uncertainty, and incompletenes theories. By Einstein, Heisenberg, and Goedel respectively. It was also those wars that nasty old dumb childish men are responsible for that created a stable society where women are able and allowed to get educations and work in science and make discoveries of their own. Youre welcome.

 

Men prevented women from voting, and then they paved the way for us to vote? They prevented us from pursuing STEM fields, but then paved the way?

The world is not as equal as many would like to think, women are still asking permission and men are denying or granting it. There are strides with equality and laws against discrimination, but the larger problem is still there.

 

Of course, the larger problem is still there. In classic feminist style playing the victim. The bigger problem... the boogey man that doesnt really exist. Just some vague idea to point fingers at.

 

From "Social Problems: Continuity & Change"

 

from same source. Women actually have it rougher than we think. When we think about poverty, often the homeless are the first who come to mind. But some of the poorest in poverty are women who are single mothers, and, of course, their children.