Legal definition of woman is based on biological sex, UK supreme court rules

[Politesse]

Identity is complicated. Self-perception is important, but not the only contributing factor in producing identity. Especially not in the context of social interaction. To consider this in the case of gender. Consider that even a foetus in the womb is often assigned a gender identity, not just a biological sex but a whole plethora of cultural expectations and expressions related to their sex but originating in their culture - their baby shower might imply that they are expected prefer pink over blue, dolls over trucks, family-raising over a career, tea over sports, that they have a female name, that they will be cherished by their father but friends with their mother, etc - when it would be physiologically impossible for them to have any real sense of self. Even once we're out and about, we only have so much control over how we are identified by others. And their perception of us is a major influence on our self-perception as well, and vice versa.

 

[Bomb#20]

I acknowledged they are often used as synonyms.

And insinuated it was ignorant.

Because it is. I don't think it's ignorant when little old Mrs. Maisie down the street who never studied the issue conflates the two, that's just the natural ebb and flow of dialectic speech.

Little old Mrs. Maisie down the street using a word sociologists think they own to express her intended meaning in accordance with the natural ebb and flow of her dialect instead of with the natural ebb and flow of sociologists' dialect does not qualify as Mrs. Maisie "conflating" anything. Assuming she is is every bit as condescending as calling her ignorant would have been.

But if a "gender critical" political activist (or a Scottish court of law that just reviewed testimony from several doctors and scientists) makes the mistake, they know what they are doing and intentionally choosing to reject or the current terminological conventions.

If they actually made the mistake of conflating anything, you'll need more evidence for that than the mere observation that they're rejecting your preferred terminological conventions. The fact that you call yours "the" current terminological conventions even though upthread we've already established their convention is just as current as yours is more snobbery on your part; your stipulation that they know what they're doing and intentionally choose to reject your convention conflicts with your claim that the usage is ignorant; and a choice to reject sociologists' current terminological conventions in favor of more familiar conventions is more likely to be a choice to make their writing comprehensible to the general public, and/or a choice to not allow themselves to be Sapir-Whorfed down a garden path to an erroneous conclusion, than to be a choice to conflate concepts.

 

[seanie]

And you could try to explain why you think discrimination on the basis of sex is “wrong”?

Because you think discriminating betweeen different classes of people is wrong, yet you’re all in favour of discriminating on the basis of “gender”.

Which you’ve yet to describe in detail.

What is it about a biological male that should allow them into a female only space?

 

[seanie]

Identity is complicated. Self-perception is important, but not the only contributing factor in producing identity. Especially not in the context of social interaction. To consider this in the case of gender. Consider that even a foetus in the womb is often assigned a gender identity, not just a biological sex but a whole plethora of cultural expectations and expressions related to their sex but originating in their culture - their baby shower might imply that they are expected prefer pink over blue, dolls over trucks, family-raising over a career, tea over sports, that they have a female name, that they will be cherished by their father but friends with their mother, etc - when it would be physiologically impossible for them to have any real sense of self. Even once we're out and about, we only have so much control over how we are identified by others. And their perception of us is a major influence on our self-perception as well, and vice versa.

No, nobody is assigning a “gender identity” to a foetus.

Sex is being observed,

Yes there are a vast array of social stereotypes put onto that reality, many of them unwelcome.

But that doesn’t alter the material reality of a person’s sex.

You seem to be saying thee can be an incongruence between someone’s perception of themselves, and society’s expectations of them in terms of their sex.

No shit, Sherlock.

The answer is to reject gender stereotypes without pretending that sex isn’t real, and sometimes matters.

 

[Bomb#20]

Identity is complicated. Self-perception is important, but not the only contributing factor in producing identity.

"Producing". You appear to be mixing up what a thing is with what caused it to be what it is.

Especially not in the context of social interaction. To consider this in the case of gender. Consider that even a foetus in the womb is often assigned a gender identity, not just a biological sex but a whole plethora of cultural expectations and expressions related to their sex but originating in their culture - their baby shower might imply that they are expected prefer pink over blue, dolls over trucks, family-raising over a career, tea over sports, that they have a female name, that they will be cherished by their father but friends with their mother, etc - when it would be physiologically impossible for them to have any real sense of self.

That's not a gender identity; that's a culturally induced expectation of what the gender identity will be. Cultural expectations are part of the social construction of gender.

Even once we're out and about, we only have so much control over how we are identified by others. And their perception of us is a major influence on our self-perception as well, and vice versa.

Vice versa, not so much. The people who perceive themselves to be a certain sex because others perceive them that way surely outnumber the people others perceive to be a certain sex because they perceive themselves that way by about a million to one. You'd have to be intersexed at a level pretty close to half and half for the public at large to let your self-perception tip their scales in judging which sex you are.

(That's not to say that a lot of people aren't perceived a certain way because they're making an effort to pass. But that's our behavior influencing others' perception of us, not our self-perception. Viola was able to pass as male by behaving for her own reasons so as to make it happen, even though she continued to perceive herself as female.)

 

[Politesse]

Your tunnel vision bringing you continually back to the issue of trans people is not helping you understand the wider questions of sex and gender, I think.

And you seem to be interpreting "identity" to mean something very specific that you have not attempted to explain, so I'm not sure how to assess your claims about it.

In general, your post seems extremely confused. If terms don't have a consistent meaning, they are not very helpful terms.

 

[Politesse]

The answer is to reject gender stereotypes without pretending that sex isn’t real, and sometimes matters.

The answer is for you to stop making up bullshit arguments that have nothing to do with my post just so you can pretend to "refute" them.

You asked me twice for a clear definition of sex. I provided one twice. You still have not read it, and are pretending I said that "sex isn't real". (??) I don't even know what that statement is supposed to mean, let alone agree with it. What I actually wrote was damn near the opposite. If it's an empirically observable fact about anatomy or physiology, we are discussing sex, by definition. I know that some people feel that culture and psychology are not real or less real than biology, though I heartily disagree with that perspective. But I've never encountered anyone who feels that anatomy or physiology are not real. So how could your conclusion possibly follow from the common definition of sex?

 

[seanie]

You denied objecting to female only prisons, sports, accommodation, changing rooms, rape counselling sessions, etc. whist arguing those spaces are wrong, that they should admit males, because discrimination against any group of people is wrong, whilst denying that is your position, whilst arguing that discrimination on the basis of “gender” is just fine and dandy.

You really haven’t thought your position through.

 

[Toni]

It’s interesting to me that some people refuse to read other people’s positions with a clear head and an interest in understanding, but instead look for points they can argue against.

 

[Politesse]

You denied objecting to female only prisons, sports, accommodation, changing rooms, rape counselling sessions, etc. whist arguing those spaces are wrong, that they should admit males, because discrimination against any group of people is wrong, whilst denying that is your position, whilst arguing that discrimination on the basis of “gender” is just fine and dandy.

No, and I don't think my political position is really all that hard to understand. I am not an authoritarian. I don't want the government to legislate every intimate aspect of my personal life. I don't want the government telling people what fucking bathroom they are "allowed" to use (when five years ago that wasn't considered a "government allowance" at all) no matter what advice they are giving them. What right does anyone in Trump's government have to tell me where I am "allowed" to take a piss, when I managed just fine the first forty years of my life, when no such advice was ever required? I don't care whether they agree with my personal moral rules or not, people should not allow restroom control to become a part of the government's mandate in the first place.

Would I personally prefer an effectively post-gender world in which people didn't give each other endless unearned shit for things they have little control over? Of course, that would obviously be a superior world for everyone. But I do not see the loss of personal freedom as an acceptable cost to pay for a more moral life, especially since its never the moral views of people like myself that predominate in such systems anyway.

 

[Bomb#20]

When you first posted the story, I specifically asked if there were no doors on the stalls. If there were, how would someone know she was peeing if not by the sound? It seemed a pretty safe assumption.

It's a safe assumption that he needs to hear her to know she's peeing; therefore it's a safe assumption that her goal is to stop him hearing her?!? Can you even hear yourself? Why would you think she's focused on whether he knows she's peeing rather than a dozen more obvious things for her to worry about, such as, say, whether he's going to hurt her?

So when you said "I know a woman who installed curtains in her car windows so she could go out to the parking lot to pee in privacy, because her workplace in its infinite wisdom decided to make the women's restroom "gender neutral"." peeing had nothing to do with her reasoning? You brought the peeing part into the situation, not me, yet you been "haranguing" me all this time for doing so???

Ah, I see what the problem is: all this time you thought I was the one who brought up the topic of the guy hearing her? I brought up peeing; therefore peeing had something to do with her reasoning; therefore her reasoning must have been all about whether he would "know she was peeing" -- is that your inference?

The stupidity you have put on display is simply astounding.

I'll not be dealing with your idiocy any further.

Sounds like it's time for us to agree to disagree. I'll agree to continue using logic; you'll agree to continue using "step two" reasoning.

 

[Bomb#20]

Sorry this one fell off my radar...

There is a HUGE difference between "ought not" and "ought not be allowed". If Emily and Seanie understand that distinction, we'd have nothing to discuss in this thread.

What did Emily and seanie say that implies they don't understand it?

I have no problem whatsoever with those two or anyone else thinking in the privacy of their own mind that trans and intersex people should be excluded from the bathroom of their choice. If those thoughts manifest as a forum post, they should expect negative replies, since their right to have those feelings is counterbalanced by the right to have different feelings. If those beliefs manifest as laws aimed at the persecution of intersex persons, there's going to be a constitutional crisis sooner or later, and all of us have a reason to care about that.

This thread is about a law.

So you have a problem with them manifesting their thought in a forum post and you feel the laws they advocate for are aimed at persecution; and you think from these facts about you it follows that they must not understand the huge difference between "ought not" and "ought not be allowed"? You appear to be implicitly relying on the premise that you're some sort of expert whom everyone of understanding would defer to.

There's no need to "defer to me" just to understand an obvious ... fact. This isn't rocket science. I would expect anyone over the age of twelve to be able to understand that legal rulings are likely to have legal consequences.

The non-rocket-science obvious fact at hand is the fact that it's perfectly possible for somebody to understand the distinction between "ought not" and "ought not be allowed" and yet still reach different conclusions from yours as to the specifics of what ought not be allowed. Inferring somebody doesn't understand merely because he thinks you're wrong is pure arrogance. You have no basis for imagining seanie and Emily don't understand that legal rulings are likely to have legal consequences.

Oh, I think they absolutely do understand that.

Ah, so you were making allegations about their state of mind you knew were false. Thanks for clearing that up.

Obviously they want to coercive power of the law to win for them what they know honest public debate never could.

Obviously everyone wants the coercive power of the law to win for them what they know honest public debate never could. What, do you think honest public debate will win for you a life of not being robbed or murdered by the first thug who wants your stuff or gets annoyed at you?

What they don't understand is that believing something does not give you some inherent right to silence and belittle your neighbor for disagreeing with you.

Is this another allegation you already know is false? When did either of them try to silence their neighbors? As for belittling, it's freedom of speech that gives you that right -- a right you've enthusiastically exercised. When did either of them indicate the right to belittle comes from believing something?

Or just for, like having a body you don't like for some stupid reason. Just because you ... BELIEVE something real hard doesn't mean it's a good idea to make a law about it. I believe a lot of things, but I don't try to silence people for disagreeing with me.

Glad to hear it. So why are you implying they do?

You literally said they're not free to do as they like in a public sociology class. That's a claim about allowance.

I have an incredibly low opinion of those who would teach things in the classroom they know to be untrue,

Oh for the love of god! Do you have evidence that "H. sapiens has no true hermaphrodites" is a claim that all professors who make "know to be untrue"? Or are you just libeling them for rhetorical purposes?

It's certainly a statement that for at least two reasons does not belong in a science classroom. A debate class, perhaps.

If they teach a subject that is relevant to human sexcuality and biology, then they have at least been exposed to the consensus of their field on the matter and have a moral responsibility to present that consensus honestly, even if they disagree with it. This is something we must routinely do, in the teaching profession. I teach plenty of things that I disagree with, you do not have to endorse information to present it. But you do have a moral imperative to correctly describe what you and your colleagues have learned about the subject, and do your best to correctly describe and contextualize any standing debates.

Well then, do you have evidence that all professors who claim "H. sapiens has no true hermaphrodites" don't tell their students other professors disagree with them? Or are you just libeling them for rhetorical purposes?

That what Trump is doing is wrong is not evidence that what the progressives are doing is right. A plague on both your houses.

Who said it was?

Progressives are only slightly less rare in academic circles than they are in general public life,

You appear to be applying a Humpty-Dumpty definition of "progressives".

 

[TomC]

Ah, I see what the problem is: all this time you thought I was the one who brought up the topic of the guy hearing her? I brought up peeing; therefore peeing had something to do with her reasoning;

The problem with the anecdote, the best I remember it, is that it was described but included nothing about her motivation or the context.
Someone asserted that she's probably a prude. I pointed out that she might be the victim of a nasty trauma in the past. There are other possibilities though. Maybe it was a political statement about office politics. "I don't like the new boss and they said that male women are now entitled to use the women's restroom. I'll just go out to my car and hang curtains so everyone knows I am pissed!*"

Honestly, the idea of a woman peeing in her car is kinda over the top. How would one even do that? It's easy if you're a guy, I've peed in my car while driving it highway speed. But I have male fixtures, it was not even difficult.
Tom

*Pun intended

 

[Bomb#20]

There's nothing like an argument from authority to establish one's commitment to the scientific method.

There's nothing like dismissing any and all arguments made by actual scientists, to make it plain that you are hawking pseudoscience.

You are fractally wrong.

1. What I dismissed contained no arguments, just an ideological slogan. How many times does it need to be pointed out that an argument is a connected series of statements intended to establish a definite proposition? "Biological sex is a label assigned by a medical professional at birth based on physical characteristics (genitalia) and other biological determinants." does not, by any stretch of the imagination, qualify. And as ideological slogans go, it is more imbecilic than average, for reasons I pointed out.

Your example of dinosaurs sets the gold standard for imbecilic arguments. Until you can provide actual scientific evidence that dinosaurs actually thought in terms of different sexes, you are simply spouting nonsense.

Why the bejesus would dinosaurs need to think in terms of different sexes in order to have biological sexes? Good lord, man, jellyfish have biological sexes, and they don't think at all, lacking central nervous systems. You appear to be making the same sort of map-territory mistake the ASRM made.

ASRM is not denying the existence of biological sexes, so what is the point of your ravings?

Under "Medical and Scientific Facts About Biological Sex", the ASRM led off with "Biological sex is a label". There were no labels in the Mesozoic Era! If it really were a medical or scientific fact that biological sex is a label, then it would follow that dinosaurs did not have biological sexes. But in point of fact, dinosaurs had biological sexes. Therefore biological sex is not a label. Therefore the ASRM's claim is false. Therefore the ASRM making a claim in a list it calls "Medical and Scientific Facts" is not a good reason to believe it's a fact.

This is IIDB. We're infidels. If Politesse wants us to believe something is a fact then he should provide a good reason to believe it's a fact -- he should provide evidence, not an argument from authority. Argument from authority is for believers. That is the point of my ravings.

What I dismissed was not promulgated by actual scientists. As you said, the source is the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. They're doctors, not scientists.

This is, as you say, fractally wrong.

Why? Because you say so? Have you even been to the ASRM's website? It's a physicians' industry association. If you have any evidence that the person who wrote

"Biological sex is a label assigned by a medical professional at birth based on physical characteristics (genitalia) and other biological determinants."
​

was an "actual scientist", feel free to present it.

Do you think it's possible for a label to exist without a label-maker?

No, I don't. And no, consequently I don't think dinosaurs considered themselves men or women, let alone "biologically male" or "female".

"Considered themselves"?!? Oh for the love of god! Do you seriously think whether a dinosaur knew what sex it was has any bearing whatever on whether it was, in point of fact, biologically male or biologically female?!? Let's try that again...

Do you think it's possible for a label to exist without a label-maker?

No, I don't.

You might as well have stopped there -- you agree a label cannot exist without a label maker. Biological sex is not a label. The ASRM's "fact sheet" contains a false claim. Game, set and match.

Social categories are always imposed on, not found in, the natural world.

Well, in the first place, that's human exceptionalism. We find plenty of social categories in the natural world. Humans aren't even the only species with wars! You think when a pride of lions systematically kills off another pride of lions, the lions don't have an "us" social category for the lions they're cooperating with and a "them" social category for the lions they're killing? The human capacity to construct social categories didn't spring fully formed from the brow of Zeus; it evolved from animal precursors.

And more to the point, in the second place, biological sex is not a social category. Gender is a social category.

Arguing about whether or not Pluto is a planet is never a question of whether Pluto exists, but rather about what it should be labeled. Likewise, the biological reality described by our sex and gender terms has always existed, but our labeling of it has not, and indeed no one was talking about "biological sex" until the beginning of the 19th century when some of its contours were becoming better understood.

Are you seriously suggesting that whether the Tyrannosaurus named Sue was a male or a female is an "Is Pluto a planet?" type of question, as opposed to an "Is Pluto's rotation prograde or retrograde?" type of question?

Terms like "Man", "woman", and "Bathroom" are considerably older than that, and they come with huge rafts of cultural, religious, and historical baggage that preceded the scientific era.

Yes; and the whole point of talking about "biological sex" instead of just "sex" is to recognize that that cultural baggage exists, and set it aside.

 

[Politesse]

This is IIDB. We're infidels. If Politesse wants us to believe something is a fact then he should provide a good reason to believe it's a fact -- he should provide evidence, not an argument from authority. Argument from authority is for believers. That is the point of my ravings.

You've offered no evidence for your perspective whatsoever. Whereas, what I was being asked at the time was for evidence of my claims concerning what is or isn't the consensus of the scientific community. Short of statements by professional organizations and the like, I'm not sure what would consitute evidence for what most medical researchers and practitioners believe generally to be true. Nothing about dinosaurs, I'm sure.

 

[Politesse]

As for the main issue at hand, unless you agree to stop pretending I've altogether denied the existence of biological sex, when I haven't - when as far as I know no one does - there's little point in further conversation. You're not discussing in good faith, and I'm getting very tired of typing the same responses over and over just for you to lie and deflect and ignore them for the umpteenth time.

 

[Emily Lake]

I think the issue is describing the difference in perviness, rapiness and violence as “male instinct”, not that there are differences.

I think it depends on whether you're interpreting "instinct" to mean a driving power that cannot be overcome, or whether you're interpreting it as a tendency toward a particular behavior.

All of us* have an instinct for fight or flight. That doesn't mean that when facing conflict we will always fight or flee - we have higher brain function and can in most cases override that instinct.

In all of the uses of "instinct" I have seen, there is a strong sense that it is natural or an innate part of behavior. In that sense, I think it is a mischaracterization that perviness, rapiness and violence is any more a "male" instinct than it is a "female" instinct. That doesn't mean that males or men are much prone to perviness, rapiness and violence, but IMO, that does not make an instinct.

I don't mind arguing over jargon on this. I don't object to it being referred to as instinct, simply because males have a significantly higher sex drive, higher evolutionary instinct to spread their seed all over the place, and an evolutionary higher level of aggression. But I also get your point, because those are the underlying drivers that result in paraphilias, sexual assault, and violence as opposed to the direct cause of them.

 

[Emily Lake]

Yes, I think it would be more correct and appropriate to describe restrooms as gender-divided, not sex-divided, just as I think gender reveal parties are misnamed.

I don't think it would be more correct or appropriate at all. In fact, I think it's rank nonsense to suggest that restrooms are gender-divided. Perhaps you *wish* that bathrooms *would become* gender divided... but I think you're out of your tree to suggest that they currently or historically have been.

For example... in the early 20th century, nobody would have expected the very rare female mathematician to use the men's restroom, no matter how much of a male social role she took on. Everyone would expect her to use the women's restroom, because everyone knows she's a woman.

Stop trying to retcon the tortured transhumanist meaning of gender into historical situations where it was clearly and unambiguously used as a direct synonym for sex.

 

[Emily Lake]

Within the context of this thread, your statement would imply that males should be given access to spaces and services where females are vulnerable or exposed as a matter of course, and should only be excluded after they've caused harm.

Well, yes. I do tend to think that criminal prosecution should not only follow a crime, but indeed following a legal hearing to determine whether the crime occurred and whether it was intended. I did not invent the principle of actus reus or mens rea, they have been a part of American law since before we were even a nation. It simply is not legal to punish a person for a crime they have not committed yet, simply because you distrust a demographic to which they belong.

Do you also believe that all doors should be required to be left open, and any stranger allowed to wander through people's houses, and action should only be taken AFTER a stranger takes something that isn't theirs?

Do you also believe that dogs should be allowed to run around off leash, and leashes should only come into consideration AFTER a dog has bitten someone or caused harm?

While I'm quite confident that you would never cop to it, you're effectively arguing that no safeguarding should ever be allowed - that we should never be allowed to do things to prevent harm from occurring. We should only ever prosecute after harm has occurred.

The fact that the harm in this context falls pretty much entirely on women doesn't seem to bother you one teensy little bit. Why is that?

 

[Emily Lake]

BTW, women also have testosterone as well as other androgens

Seriously, actually read what I write Toni.