Ja Du is Filipino

[Trausti]

Humans has built in, hardoded, features that makes your gender identity. There are no such features for race identity, because race is not a biological thing. It is s political/social thing.

Of course race is biological.

Not for creationists.

 

[Trausti]

And you obviously doeznt realize that this cartoon actuslly makes the oppsite point of what you think?
That before post structuralism, gender studies it was the opinion of the man standing on the neck that counted.

Actually: you are them man standing on the neck. (Tacking abou ”SJWs” and downtalking measures taken to mitigate discrimination)

The cartoon is about objective vs. subject reality. How did you miss that?

How does an ordinary person go about determining the objective reality of someone else's identity? We're not gods. We don't just lounge around in heaven observing 'things unseen' like they do.

Can a person be Filipino if they don't have Filipino genes? Can a person be female if they have the Y chromosome? Is identity strictly based on one's genetic code, or does it arise from something else?

This sudden difficulty by some in the ability to discern between male and females just lacks credulity. That someone feels a preference to present as the opposite sex, perhaps due to in utero chemical imbalances, does not change objective reality.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

Why do you start writing of a totally different subject?
Humans has built in, hardoded, features that makes your gender identity. There are no such features for race identity, because race is not a biological thing. It is s political/social thing.

I don't agree with your premise that race is not a biological thing. But if it isn't, and gender is, then doesn't that make a stronger case for trans-racial than for trans-sexual? If you are born with a penis and genetics that make your gender identity, then it seems rather difficult to change that or to decide that you are not what your genes say you are. If race is just political and social, then surely we can change our race with politics and social change. So why does society smile on a white man wearing a dress but frown on him wearing black face?

 

[Arctish]

How does an ordinary person go about determining the objective reality of someone else's identity? We're not gods. We don't just lounge around in heaven observing 'things unseen' like they do.

Can a person be Filipino if they don't have Filipino genes? Can a person be female if they have a Y chromosome? Is identity strictly based on one's genetic code, or does it arise from something else?

Identity is a complex topic. One thing is for sure, though, that is that you alone don't get to decide your identity in most if not all cases. One of these cases is national/ethnic identity. I may claim to be Japanese, but that claim holds very little weight if no other Japanese person believes that. I choose Japanese identity as an example, because that is one that is particularly strict. Indeed, even people born and raised in Japan, who have a Japanese parent, are not considered Japanese if their other parent is not. They are considered hafu.

Identity is very complicated. But your identity isn't something others can decide for you. They might reject you as a member of their community for various reasons. They might refuse to admit or acknowledge you, or ex-communicate you, or strip you of membership and banish you. But while all those things affect your social status, it doesn't change your identity.

There was another reason I brought Jews and Jewishness into this conversation. Israelis have been trying to make Israel's status as The Jewish State a matter of law, not just custom, and they haven't been able to do it. They keep getting stuck on how to go about defining Jewishness.

Is it genome based? If so, then Jewish converts and their descendants aren't Jews. That would exclude a lot of Jews from membership in the community and alienate a lot of others. It could potentially recognize a lot of Palestinians as members of the Jewish community if they go with the idea that it can be conferred through matrilineal descent.

Is it based on religion? If so, then which version of the religion would be the Official Faith of the Jewish State? The ultra Orthodox Jews are pretty insistent their version is the only true version. If that position becomes law, liberal Jews would no longer be accepted as genuinely Jewish, and that would alienate a huge part of the diaspora.

Is it cultural? That's a non-starter. Yiddish speaking Jews from Northern and Central Europe share only loose cultural ties with Arabic-speaking Jews from Northern Africa and the Middle East or Ladino speaking Jews from Turkey. Israelis have been trying to eliminate those differences by establishing a unified, Hebrew speaking community within Israel but that does nothing to address cultural differences outside it. Once again, Israelis risk alienating a huge segment of the Jewish diaspora if the define Jewishness too narrowly.

And all of ^this^ has nothing to do with whether a particular person might consider him/her/themself to be Jewish.

Whether someone is a male or a female is one of those things that one doesn't get to decide. Sex is a biological phenomenon that for the vast majority of cases in mammals falls into two clearly differentiated cases. For a minority of cases, this is not possible, and you say there is a third category of intersex, and there are many possible further sub-categorizations. And yes, this is due to genetics. In animals, at least, sex is fundamentally a function of your gametes. Large gametes are female. Small gametes are male. In mammals, there is chromosomal-based sex determination, where the heterogametic (two different chromosomes) sex is male, and the homogametic sex is female. In birds, this is reversed (male birds have two ZZ chromosomes).

In some species, sex-determination is external. Perhaps a well-known example is temperature-sensitive sex-determination, like in alligators and crocodiles. There are all manner of quirky ways in which this can happen, some quite interesting. In some species, dominant members of a group (usually means the largest) become female, and in others, a dominant member will become male. There are some species that can change sex back and forth during adulthood. There are hermaphroditic species, and this is very common in plants.

Sex is genome based, and it isn't always an either/or kind of thing. There are people with XX , XY, XXY, XXXY, XXYY, and other chromosome pattern variations. There are people with the XX pattern in some of their cells and XY in others. There are people with the XY chromosome pattern of a male who are largely immune to the effects of testosterone and appear to be female. Some of them undergo physical changes that make then appear more male than female during puberty, but some don't. There are XY males who have female-like brain structures. So while most people are either male or female on a genetic, biological level, some are on a continuum between those two positions.

Gender isn't the same as sex. Gender is more of a psychological state of being. Like sex, it isn't an either/or, binary kind of thing. It's a continuum, with most people at either end and some people somewhere in the middle. Also, it doesn't appear to be 'fixed'. People can live as fully male one day and fully female another.

 

[J842P]

Identity is very complicated. But your identity isn't something others can decide for you. They might reject you as a member of their community for various reasons. They might refuse to admit or acknowledge you, or ex-communicate you, or strip you of membership and banish you. But while all those things affect your social status, it doesn't change your identity.

I've omitted the sex/gender stuff because I think we largely agree.

However, here is an interesting place where I don't think we do agree. To me, it is absurd to say that others cannot decide on your identity. To me, this smacks of a peculiarly American sort of individualism that says you are free to be whatever you want to be. It is a nice ideal, and it is part of the allure of the Unite States for many immigrants, but I think the reality of the world is that much of our identity is thrust upon us by society. Especially historically, your society/tribe/clan played the most influential role on your identity. The majority of human history has been this way, so whether you were a noble or a commoner was not your choice, it was something foisted on you.

 

[Arctish]

Identity is very complicated. But your identity isn't something others can decide for you. They might reject you as a member of their community for various reasons. They might refuse to admit or acknowledge you, or ex-communicate you, or strip you of membership and banish you. But while all those things affect your social status, it doesn't change your identity.

I've omitted the sex/gender stuff because I think we largely agree.

However, here is an interesting place where I don't think we do agree. To me, it is absurd to say that others cannot decide on your identity. To me, this smacks of a peculiarly American sort of individualism that says you are free to be whatever you want to be. It is a nice ideal, and it is part of the allure of the Unite States for many immigrants, but I think the reality of the world is that much of our identity is thrust upon us by society. Especially historically, your society/tribe/clan played the most influential role on your identity. The majority of human history has been this way, so whether you were a noble or a commoner was not your choice, it was something foisted on you.

I think you're right to a large degree. We get much of our identity from our families and society. But some of us renounce that identity, or at least parts of it, as we grow older.

I was once a Catholic from the Boston area. Now I'm an atheist from Alaska. I will always be a member of my birth family but I joined another family when I got married. The identity I get from my social situation is subject to change, and the identity I get from my self image can change too.

I have a friend who calls himself a Scot. He was born in the USA, has never lived in Scotland, and has no plans to emigrate or renounce his American citizenship. He wears a utility kilt as often as not, and participates in the Highland Games each year. He knows the history of his family, sept, and clan, and regularly attends the annual clan gathering in the Lower 48. So my question is, is he Scottish? He thinks so and I accept that.

 

[dismal]

Okay.

You don't have an answer, or you don't want to share it.

This thread was an opportunity to discuss identity and the concept of choice vs. genetic determinism. It could have been about what it means to be transgender, or transsexual, or transracial. We could have discussed the significance of the Y chromosome in a person with the XXY chromosomal pattern. We could have discussed cultural identity, and how ethnicity is decided in a population descended from people from all parts of the world. We could have discussed how legal rights based on ancestry conflict with or reinforce notions of national/cultural identity.

But, alas. All we've got are a few posters using this opportunity to mock someone for being trans-something.

There's a new thread that asks, Should trans "women" be allowed in women's shelters?. Maybe that one will spark a deeper discussion than this one did.

Hmm, I thought I did have an answer. My answer is more about how such things should be decided. I imagine there are many different ways to define who is and isn't a Jew.

I have no great need to choose one. I can tolerate these many ways existing. I don't even know what they are or their relative merits.

Up to now, everyone I have ever known who says they are Jewish I have accepted they are without further inquiry. I have had no reason or need to call someone Jewish who did not claim to be.

Others may have want of need for a different definition of Jew, I do not.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

I have a friend who calls himself a Scot. He was born in the USA, has never lived in Scotland, and has no plans to emigrate or renounce his American citizenship. He wears a utility kilt as often as not, and participates in the Highland Games each year. He knows the history of his family, sept, and clan, and regularly attends the annual clan gathering in the Lower 48. So my question is, is he Scottish? He thinks so and I accept that.

From what you write, he appears to be Scottish by heritage, but not by nationality. I too would consider him Scottish. Now, if he had no ancestors who lived in Scotland, didn't have a family history with sept and clan (what is a sept?), and was a Japanese guy who just moved to America, but still wore the utility kilt as often as not and still participated in the Highland Games each year, then would he be Scottish? Interesting question. That would be more like Ja Du.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

However, here is an interesting place where I don't think we do agree. To me, it is absurd to say that others cannot decide on your identity. To me, this smacks of a peculiarly American sort of individualism that says you are free to be whatever you want to be. It is a nice ideal, and it is part of the allure of the Unite States for many immigrants, but I think the reality of the world is that much of our identity is thrust upon us by society. Especially historically, your society/tribe/clan played the most influential role on your identity. The majority of human history has been this way, so whether you were a noble or a commoner was not your choice, it was something foisted on you.

"Identity" is multi-faceted. There is your identity in you see yourself, and there is your identity in how others see you.

So this breaks down to two questions really.

1. Do you have a right to declare yourself whatever you want? Or are there limits on this? Is it ok for white supremecists to declare themselves the superior race? Is it ok for me to declare myself royalty and refer to myself as a King?

2. Do you have a right to force others to regard you how you want to be regarded? That's the Jordan Peterson pronoun debate.