This is going to get long. I don't think there's any way around it being lengthy. If you wish to break them into separate posts in response, that's fine.
I'll start by pointing out that I'm trying to assess YOUR position, and I've tried to frame it objectively and accurately (except for the very last item, arguably). Many of the responses you've provided here are NOT based on YOUR position, but on what you assume other people's are. I'll point that out where it happens, and request that you reposition your responses.
... if you think Emily is misrepresenting your position, cue Loretta Swit playing the world's smallest violin just for you.
@Politesse Alternatively, if you think I'm misrepresenting your position, perhaps you might actually let me know exactly where you disagree with how I've framed your view, and what it is that I've gotten wrong?
This is the third time I'm asking you this:
How about you tell me which part(s) of this argument you disagree with?
That is quite a wall of text you're asking me to respond to. I'm going to be deeply annoyed if I go through the trouble of answering it, and you simply ignore or dismiss the answers with some flippant bullshit about spergs. But answer it I will.
- A person's gender identity is whatever that person says their gender identity is.
This statement seems neither fully true nor fully untrue, and I'm not clear whether you mean "disagree with" in the sense of thinking it is factually untrue, or "disagree with" in the sense of supporting or opposing your political views. It is factually incorrect to say that gender - one's social identity - is entirely up to individuals, or we would not have any occasion for public debate on the subject. All humans in all societies known to history and ethnography have assigned gender categories, and children are sorted into them at some point in their very early life. An individual obviously has no say in this first assignment, and changing other people's perspectives on your gender later in life tends to be, at best, a strenuous and long-term process for the affected. So, no, a person cannot always change the perceptions of others concerning their gender. Not everyone who feels misgendered in interior life feels safe to even
try to change the perceptions of others on the matter, and even people who are "out" and living their lives fully as their preferred gender usually face kickback from those friends and family that knew them before their transition, government interference, church and mosque interference, and so on. All of that affects gender, which is never fixed as a concept, but a perception that changes and evolves over time. I know many trans people, and none who would describe society as having fully accepted their transition. Not even in a gay bar could universal acceptance be assured to any trans person - they are everyone's dart board.
On the other hand, politically I would certainly
prefer a society in which a person could change or correct their gender in the eyes of others, and that is something that many people have accomplished in their lives, however incompletely. In that it is a choice, acceptance of others is a choice many people make, and should make in my personal opinion. As you yourself know perhaps better than anyone, given as it is how we first met and why you "hate" me, I take an incredibly dim view towards people who intentionally misgender, deadname, or otherwise dehumanize trans people.
What you've provided here is a lot of discussion of gender
roles, but not as much on gender
identity. I'm using progressive academic terminology here, Poli.
Gender refers to the suite of all social expectations that are based on a person's perceived or assumed sex. This includes aspects of social presentation (clothing, makeup, stockings, jewelry, hair styles, etc.) as well as behavioral norms (boys should be loud, rambunctious, decisive, and take control; girls should be quiet, supportive, obsequious, and caring) and functional expectations (men should be providers, protectors, job-holders, and decision-makers for the household; women should be caregivers, child-rearers, and should maintain the house and home).
Gender roles refer almost entirely to the latter category of functional expectations. It refers to the types of social functions and roles that each sex is expected (or in some cases required) to perform, as well as those which they are prohibited from performing. In the US, where we live, and which is contextually relevant to my interaction with you, very little is either required or prohibited on the basis of sex these days... although it's been less than a century since women have been allowed to do things like own property, have bank accounts and credit in their own names, and be CEOs of a company or hold political office. But the roles of provider versus supporter, decision-maker, and child-rearer still have a lot of sway.
Gender identity refers to the internal perspective a person has about gender they most align with. It's an internal feeling about whether an individual fits better with the social presentation, behavioral norms, and functional expectations of one sex or the other (or both or neither).
With that clarification in mind... The fundamental question to you is:
Do you believe that a person's gender identity is whatever that person says their gender identity is? Note that I'm not asking whether other people accept their identity, how other people perceive them, or anything else - just whether or not in your view a person's stated gender
identity is their own to define.
What a person says their gender identity is cannot be challenged, and must be accepted by other people as being true.
This is obviously untrue. You yourself challenge people's gender identity routinely, as do many others like you.
Again, I'm asking you what you believe. Do you, Poli, believe that a person's stated gender identity is should not be challengeable. For the moment, we'll make the simplifying assumption that nobody lies about their gender identity, and that all statements of gender identity are genuinely felt and believed.
Perhaps I should rephrase this...
Do you, Poli, believe that a person can be wrong about their gender identity? Do you believe that it's possible for a person to be mistaken about how they feel and how they perceive which social gender best fits them?
- A person who has just realized their true gender identity an hour ago is just as valid as a person who has had a stable gender identity for as long as they can remember.
I have no idea what you mean by "valid" here, so I don't know what you mean exactly. But I've never met anyone who deduced that they are transgender on the strength of merely an hour's self-reflection. Negotiating what gender is, and means to you, is a complex and usually lifelong process. Surely you yourself, though cis, have experienced change and evolution in your personal understanding of womanhood and what it requires of you. What it allows, what it restricts, what others expect of you, and what you are willing to accept.
Again, you've substituted "gender" for "gender
identity". Given the clarifications I've provided above, and with due focus on the identity aspect of it all...
Do you, Poli, believe that any period of time is required for a person's stated gender identity to be a genuine expression of their belief about their internal gender?
Again, I'll rephrase...
On the assumption that nobody ever lies, if a person who you have always known as a male tells you today that they actually identify as a woman, do you, Poli, think that there is any acceptable reason to reject their stated identity?
- Some people have a gender identity that is fluid depending on time or mood, and that's also valid and real.
That certainly is a real phenomenon. Whether it is "valid" or not likely depends on who you're asking and in what context. I presume you consider that "invalid" somehow yourself, though I'm curious what you think that invalidity should mean in practical terms. Do you just mean that you don't like it, or do you believe there should be some sort of governmental interference with those who might otherwise choose to identify as gender-fluid?
Neither. You actually pretty much answered with your first sentence - you accept and believe that having an unstable and shifting gender identity is a real phenomenon.
I will clarify a small bit:
Do you, Poli, believe that if a person tells you that they identify as gender fluid, that means that their feeling of which gender (social presentation, behavioral norms, and functional expectations) best fits them as an individual is unstable and shifting?
- Cisgender people are not required to dress in sex-typical clothing, or to present as typical for their sex.
Required by whom? Some societies in the world and even in the country do formally restrict what clothing persons of a certain gender are permitted to wear, at least without facing severe social or legal consequences, and gender and sex tend to be closely related. I do reject your misclassification of sartorial taboos as being
sex-related. Expectations concerning clothing vary according to culture, and are a part of culture; they can only and do only correspond to gender categories. Thus, expectations for clothing vary along with whatever gender categories may be acknowledged by that culture. Along with whatever complicating factors may affect sartorial taboos. Age, for instance, often affects gender expectations concerning clothing, with the general universal trend being toward more fluid and possibly altogether non-delineated dress expectations concerning children, but strictly gender-divided rules concerning adults.
In the US, where you and I both live, and where we're interacting with each other on this topic...
Do you, Poli, believe that cisgender people should to be required to dress in sex-typical clothing or to otherwise adhere to social presentation expectations?
Cisgender females can have short hair, wear no make-up, wear trousers and steel-toed work-boots; cisgender males can wear make-up, have long hair, and wear dresses.
They obviously can do so, though that personal freedom will almost certainly come at a social cost. I assume you mean in your home country and culture, not universally? Obviously not all cultures have identical expectations of external affect. But even the US, the above would comes as a considerable point of dispute in most communities. During the "Second Wave" of political feminism, securing the right of women to wear trousers and appropriate work-related PPE was a major item of political dispute and activism, as I am sure you remember. There has been no such advancement of clothing-freedom for men, and a man who wears "female" clothes is subject at least to considerable social ridicule, and is very often at risk of real personal danger. In many states, he can also be fired from a job, expelled from a courtroom, or many other such formal consequences for his choices. Most legislation aimed at illegalizing "drag shows" has this very behavior in mind, and often the law itself makes no provision for context.
So I think I would rate this one as "mostly true in the US" as concerns "females", and "mostly untrue in the US" as concerns males.
- A person's clothing and presentation choices do not dictate their gender identity.
This seems neither altogether true nor altogether false to me. Obviously clothing and presentation are not the
only ways in which gender is perceived or expressed. They are important, though, definitely gender-coded, and one of the ways in which gender norms are often both communicated and enforced to the next generation. If someone makes "choices" that do not conform to common social expectations, they can be assured of at least some social consequences for doing so, some positive and some negative depending on their situation.
- Given that presentation does not dictate gender identity, transgender people are also under no obligation to present in the ways considered typical of the opposite sex.
I can't make heads or tails of what you're trying to say with this one, sorry. What does one have to do with the other? And what kind of "obligation" do you mean?
Given that you and I both live in the US, and with all of the prior clarifications that I've given, I'll bundle these three items and attempt to rephrase:
Do you, Poli, believe that neither cisgender nor transgender should be socially obligated to present in any specific way? Do you, Poli, believe that a transwoman should be given just as much leeway to wear trousers and t-shirts and cons as any ciswoman would be given, without that transwoman's gender identity being called into question? Do you, Poli, believe that a transwoman who wears jeans and a t-shirt and sneakers is just as much of a woman as a ciswoman who does so, or do you feel that a transwoman should be expected to wear sex-specific clothing like dresses or skirts, heels, etc. as well as make-up?
- Surgical and/or hormonal alteration can be expensive. It often has other health risks as well. Because of this, neither hormonal nor surgical alteration is required for a person to be transgender.
Required by whom? I don't see how this one can have a universal answer that applies equally well to all communities. Some people would accept this and some would not. Certainly within LGTBQ-tolerant communities it is generally understood that an incredibly expensive surgery performed by only a handful of providers and not covered by insurance is not going to be on the cards for most people whether or not that is "right". It is also true that not everyone who is transgendered even wants to attempt such a transition, and that transitions of this kind are a procedure of relatively recent invention and are not equally available in all communities or nations.
Required by you, Poli. As you're the person I'm asking about your views and your beliefs. I'm trying to make sure that I'm not misrepresenting your position, as it pertains to the US - the place where both of us live.
- A female person can have breasts, vagina, uterus, and no exogenous testosterone and still identify as a transman, and their gender identity is completely valid.
- A male person can have chest hair and a beard, penis and testicles, and take no estrogen supplements and still identify as a transwoman, and their gender identity is completely valid.
- A person of either natal sex can take any combination of hormones or alterations or take none at all and still identify as nonbinary, and their gender identity is completely valid.
All three of these are repeating this notion of "valid", and once again what you mean by valid is less than obvious. Valid according to whom? What is it that you think validity means or should mean? Obviously there are many people who woud not consider any of those situations "valid", for a host of reasons.
Once again, I'm asking you, Poli, what your belief is.
Do you, Poli, think that a male person should be able to identify as a transwoman without making any physician or hormonal changes at all, and that other people should be expected to accept them as women in all respects and in all situations? Same for the other combinations listed.
Alternatively...
Do you, Poli, think that it is reasonable for other people to reject a male's claim of being a woman if that male has made no physical alterations to their body at all and appears in every somatic respect to be a man?
- People should be given the right by law to use facilities and services that align with their gender identity in all circumstances.
People already
have that right in most polities, but I do disapprove of attempts to use the law to take away that right.
Actually, they haven't had that right anywhere until quite recently, and in most places they still don't have that right. The law has been silent on this, neither conferring nor denying the legal use of such spaces. There has been a well-established social convention of facilities being separated on the basis of sex, up until quite recently when some states have explicitly granted this right legislatively.
I'm snipping here, and moving the remainder to different posts.
