my view of gender is actually much closer to the social constructionist approaches to gender of authors like Butler and Foucault than your cultural perspective is. Like me, they view gender in terms of a constellation of shared patterns of behaviors that bind communities.
— Joshs
Of course, but that's in full agreement with my definition of gender as well. Gender is socially constructed, and gender is often used as a binding or enforcement tool for behaviors that the particular culture desires people to act on — Philosophim
Foucault’s approach is quite different from Butler’s — Number2018
Foucault rejects the essentialist perspective on the source of power as an ultimate instance of rights, identity, intelligibility, or recognition — Number2018
I thought your definition of gender was whatever someone says it is, because your view of social construction is randomly assigned behavioral definitions by individuals, or groups who wield power over individuals to force them to act in certain ways. — Joshs
The key notion I want to emphasize from this summary is that for Foucault socially constructed knowledge and values are not imposed on a community by an individual or group wielding power and desiring that the community act a certain way. Instead, they form an integrated pattern of understanding with its own internal ‘logic’ not imposed by anybody in particular, and not in top down fashion but disseminating itself through a culture from the bottom up , as a shared pattern of thinking and behaving. — Joshs
The transgender view of gender is a consequence of gender being a social construct — Judaka
The problem with focusing on the "logic of the language" is that language, generally, but especially with the word "gender" is deeply influenced by one's views on the matter. — Judaka
Even if that wasn't true, how a word is defined shouldn't compel anyone to think in any specific way. If the language around sex or gender didn't fit the logic that I thought was accurate or best, then I would simply use the words in the way I wanted instead, and that's 100% common practice. — Judaka
You aren't even remotely neutral here, your political views are included in your interpretation of these concepts and ideas, and I say that as someone who pretty much agrees with you. — Judaka
Though for me, the reason why separation by sex shouldn't be overridden by gender is that the reasons for separating people by sex are primarily physical and have nothing to do with gender. — Judaka
You've interpreted gender as overriding sex, which it might be based on your perspective on gender & sex, what you think these words mean and based on what you consider "overriding" but that's where the subjectivity is. — Judaka
In politics, "Ten people who speak make more noise than ten thousand who are silent". The worst thing you can try to do is change the minds of those who staunchly disagree with you, a lot of effort with no payoff. Instead, convince people on the fence, or those who were slightly on your side to fully commit. — Judaka
I know that Foucault’s approach is different from Butler’s. — Joshs
It is worth considering again the principal difference between Foucault and Butler. Butler writes:” I contravene Foucault in some respects. For if the Foucauldian wisdom seems to consist in the insight that regulatory power has certain broad historical characteristics and that it operates on gender as well as on other kinds of social and cultural norms, then it seems that gender is but the instance of a larger regulatory operation of power. I would argue against this subsumption of gender to regulatory power that the regulatory apparatus that governs gender is one that is itself gender specific. Gender requires and institutes its own distinctive regulatory and disciplinary regime.” (Butler, ‘Undoing gender,’ pg. 41) On another side, Foucault asserts that biopolitical norms do not primarily work to exclude and repress the deviating individuals; in contrast, they encompass the whole spectrum of practices, producing an account of what is normal and abnormal. ‘Power that comes from everywhere’ animates the discursive formation and the encompassing greed of intelligibility concerning gender. So, while Foucault’s project is based on ‘constitutive inclusion,’ Butler insists on the principle of ‘constitutive exclusion.’” Even when a form of recognition is allegedly extended to all the people, there remains an active premise that there is a vast region of those who remain unrecognizable.” (Butler, ‘Notes toward a performative theory of assembly,’ pg. 5) A disenfranchised group should find a way to claim effective all-embraced recognition. An open-ended hegemonic struggle should produce performative effects reconfiguring the general field of acceptability and identification. To a considerable extent, Butler’s approach expresses today’s dominating tendencies in the struggle for gender equality and identity politics. Yet, contradicting her premise of the importance of a precarious community, Butler underlines a crucial role of media globalization: “The performativity of gender presumes a field of appearance in which gender appears, and a scheme of recognizability with which gender shows up…The media does not merely report the scene of appearance; it constitutes the scene in a time and space that includes and exceeds its local instantiation…it depends on that mediation to take place as the event as it is” (‘Notes toward a performative theory of assembly,’ pg. 92) Here, Butler does not refer back to Foucault’s discursive formation of socially constructed shared pattern of thinking and behaving. Instead, she implicitly invokes the decisive role of the global digital medium. Accordingly, as Deleuze points out in ‘The Postscript of control society,’ we should discern the bits and flows of data that make up dividuals and data banks, always passing beneath the individual. The newest techniques of power permeate the patterns of desires, ideas, and imaginations that constitute our subjectivity and agency.The key notion I want to emphasize is that for Foucault socially constructed knowledge and values are not imposed on a community by an individual or group wielding power and desiring that the community act a certain way. Instead, they form an integrated pattern of understanding with its own internal ‘logic’ not imposed by anybody in particular, and not in top down fashion but disseminating itself through a culture from the bottom up , as a shared pattern of thinking and behaving. — Joshs
Here, Butler does not refer back to Foucault’s discursive formation of socially constructed shared pattern of thinking and behaving. Instead, she implicitly invokes the decisive role of the global digital medium. Accordingly, as Deleuze points out in ‘The Postscript of control society,’ we should discern the bits and flows of data that make up dividuals and data banks, always passing beneath the individual. The newest techniques of power permeate the patterns of desires, ideas, and imaginations that constitute our subjectivity and agency — Number2018
That’s interesting, thanks. So you think that Deleuze is in closer accord with Butler on this matter than he is with Foucault? — Joshs
Its not interpretation. Its using the definitions provided in the OP which the transgender community accepts to come to a conclusion. Hopefully a logical conclusion, but that's what debate is for. — Philosophim
There is wisdom in that, but if I wanted to discuss politics or try to change the political world, I wouldn't be on a philosophy forum — Philosophim
probably would've been if people weren't afraid to speak against this movement — Judaka
athletes who transitioned long after puberty, in some cases just a year or so before competing — Judaka
Definitions aren't enough, even if the "transgender community" accepted them, that doesn't mean they would accept your conclusions using these definitions — Judaka
Nonetheless, my aim was to provide an explanation for why political discourse has strayed so far from how we might wish people would act, I hope you continue to conduct yourself as you have. — Judaka
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