More specifically, gender was the social aspect of sex. Stereotypical behaviors and societal roles that correlated strongly with sex — Roke

So you don't think sex and gender are synonymous? Is gender is a social construct?

These days, most seem pretty confused about it. I'm confused about it. There seems to be some demand to change how it works, but I honestly don't understand what's being demanded. — Roke

Yes, I think there is some degree of confusion, left and right. Left because people who are socially progressive aren't always philosophically literate and right because people who are socially conservative sometimes don't want to be.

I think the insistence to distinguish sex and gender doesn't amount to something being demanded as much as an insistence that fewer demands be made on the basis of sex. If you are a biological determinist, or biological essentialist, about sex and gender, for instance, you are likely to judge that someone who doesn't comply with a demand regarding how people of a given sex ought to behave isn't entitled to be considered normal. This socially prevalent demand for normal behavior, construed with reference to the alleged link between biological sex and gender-appropriate behavior, seems grounded into a form of the naturalistic fallacy (or, sometimes, divine command).

For most of my life 'gender' was considered a polite synonym for sex, because the word 'sex' was considered a bit risqué. That has lead to many forms asking for people's gender when they actually mean sex. Simone de Beauvoir saw gender as an oppressive collection of cultural expectations about behaviour, based on people's sex, and she wished it would disappear. I agree with de Beauvoir, and see the best way towards this being to work towards discarding the notion of gender, so that people of any sex should feel free to dress, talk and generally behave in whatever way they want.

My minor way of contributing to this rebellion is to cross out the label 'Gender' whenever it appears on a form I am asked to fill in, and write next to it 'Sex'. Yeah, call me a dangerous radical, but somebody's got to do it.

I have male biology, so my sex is male. I also view myself as being a male, so my gender is male. On forms, in sports, etc. - sex is more important to know than gender.

Most dictionaries include the same definition for sex and gender,

The properties that distinguish organisms on the basis of their reproductive roles.

I all ways thought that people just used gender instead of sex because it sounds weird talking peoples "sex role" whereas "gender role" is OK. I think they still do, they just don't know it.

My minor way of contributing to this rebellion is to cross out the label 'Gender' whenever it appears on a form I am asked to fill in, and write next to it 'Sex'. Yeah, call me a dangerous radical, but somebody's got to do it. — andrewk

I remember some stupid form the embassy sent to all of the expats living around here, he got pissed of when someone wrote "yes please" as an answer to the question about sex. The next form had gender on it. I doubt he ever figured out who done it. He he.

My minor way of contributing to this rebellion is to cross out the label 'Gender' whenever it appears on a form I am asked to fill in, and write next to it 'Sex'. Yeah, call me a dangerous radical, but somebody's got to do it. — andrewk

hahaha. That's pretty great. Thank you for inspiring me. : D

In response to the opening poster. Gender is social constructed and therefore maliable. Biological sex is not. Once you know that then you'll truly realize how often people confused transsexual and transgender.
: /

People are saying because it’s different depending on cultures that it is therefore malleable, but my question is, because it is malleable on a societal level, does that then imply that it is also malleable on a individual level? And also does the fact that it changes mean that all forms of change are good? Can there be change in a negative sense or is it always positive? (Like is implied with this ‘accept the change’ narrative) — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Seems a bit of a non-sequitur. I don't think accepting the malleability of cultural norms precludes one from taking a harsh stance towards specific changes occuring in their society.

There have been some prominent culturally conservative philosophers who've embraced the notion of the historicity of human values, practices, etc. while also thinking the modern world represents a sharp decline relative to previous eras. I'm thinking along the lines of Nietzsche, Heidegger, and a few others who compared our situation unfavorably in many ways to previous eras, especially the glory days of the ancient Greeks.

They, too, wanted change, but the type of radical change they longed for would be a nightmare for most political and social progressives out there today.

I'll re-read the specific post I responded to - and I only responded to one of the many questions you posed - before commenting in detail.

Quickly though, I assumed I was offering support of your intuition that change is not always for the better. That seems a questionable modern prejudice which I'm pretty sure you don't share based on the overall tone of your post and the specific questions you raised in it.

But yeah, I'll read again and check back...

PS I certainly don’t see the ancient Greeks as the good old days lol — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Most don't of course. But the larger point is that one can be a radical historicist, a fierce critic of the modern world as being essentially nihilistic, and a proponent of radical change all at the same time.

The only relevance of this I guess is that it challenges the standard and IMO oversimplified progressive/conservative dichotomy.

No no not your conclusions, but the conclusions of those who hold the position that change ipso facto is positive. I should have made that clear.

I absolutely agree with you that there may be significant points of convergence between the two sides in the debate. I've actually spent a good deal of time thinking about this very issue and typically get positive feedback from those I pitch my ideas to.

It clearly involves clarifying terms and engaging in other tedious but essential legwork, but it's an important topic that I'd like to discuss elsewhere. I don't want to distract from Roke's topic any more than I already have, so let's start a discussion on that one and get to work.

If I, as a straight white cis gendered male, decided I wanted to walk around in jock strap, an undersized bright illuminescent pink tutu and a bow tie from now on in public, should I be able to? Or should society have a say in whether or not that is appropriate? And where is that line? There has to be a line somewhere, but there is more focus on the fact that people should be able to express themselves than trying to establish when people are going too far. — Mr Phil O'Sophy

You want a line somewhere? How about a line that says that if it is acceptable for people with one type of genitalia to wear a particular item of clothing then it is acceptable for people with a different type of genitalia to wear that same item of clothing? Nothing about biology makes it the case that it's appropriate for people with male genitalia to wear trousers but not skirts or for people with female genitalia to wear skirts but not trousers, or for people with female genitalia to wear make up and high heels but not people with male genitalia.

And although historically there may have been a connection between the use of the pronouns "he" and "she" or the nouns "man" and "woman" and the biology of the person being talked about, there's no compelling reason to insist that this use can't evolve as has been the case with other words. Meanings change.

These are the socially constructed gender norms that need not be dogmatically followed.

is there not something inappropriate about children seeing up a mans skirt when he's sat down on public transport with his legs open? (which Men tend to do more often than females) — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Is there not something inappropriate about children seeing up a woman's skirt when she's sat down on a public transport with her legs open?

Of course. But it doesn't then follow that it's inappropriate for men or women to wear skirts. Only that it's inappropriate to look up someone's skirt and for someone wearing a skirt to sit with their legs open.

Besides, how is it different to a kilt?

So how about a man wearing skin tight yoga pants? Especially if said man happens to be fully loaded with junk that can't be hidden, and due to the skin tightness of the yoga pants can be clearly seen and outlined. Should that be acceptable in public?

Perhaps not, but then that has nothing to do with the fact that it's "women's" clothing and everything to do with the fact that the outline of his genitals is visible (which I assume is less decent than the outline of a woman's breasts being visible)? We can always have a secondary rule that prohibits these exceptional cases.

But then do a Google image search for "men in yoga pants". Hardly the horror show you're making it out to be.

I think of gender as having two sides of identity -- a social identity and a personal identity. They aren't stereotypes as much as they expressions and impressions; expressions to others and expressions to self, impressions from others and impressions from self. Depending on how fine we wish our gender categories to be we could actually generate numerous such groupings depending on how people express and are impressed upon by others and their self.

It's also a much more complex and bigger question than even triadic or quarternary designations really imply. Gender is an aspect of identity, and so is actually a topic worthy of study because of this complexity and our general ignorance of the phenomena. (that is, it's more than just how we use words, it's an actual phenomena that can be studied)

That has lead to many forms asking for people's gender when they actually mean sex. Simone de Beauvoir saw gender as an oppressive collection of cultural expectations about behaviour, based on people's sex, and she wished it would disappear. — andrewk

Simone de Beauvoir herself was probably confused about her own gender/sex by how she developed. This particular line in her Wikipedia article is telling:

"De Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fuelled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!" — Wikipedia

Even IF gender and sex were not synonyms based on the way that they are being defined (physiology vs. behavior), physiology normally defines one's behavior. In every other species, each organism reacts to, and interacts with, another based on their perception of the attributes of the other - like their health and sex. In other words, males not only act like males but are treated as such by others of it's kind.

In humans you find this tiny fraction of the population confused about it's sex because of how they were interacted with as they developed from a very young age.

As near as I can tell, which is to say by consultation with a dictionary, "gender" has to do with the state of being male or female, or the perception of being male or female, or perhaps the state or perception of being something else, but according to cultural and social differences and characteristics rather than biological.

I don't find this definition particularly enlightening. But whatever else "gender" may be, I think it's in any case something that certain lawyers (I'm a lawyer), academics, psychologists, sociologists, pundits and politicians will find a way to exploit for their own benefit as best they can.

If you are a biological determinist, or biological essentialist, about sex and gender, for instance, you are likely to judge that someone who doesn't comply with a demand regarding how people of a given sex ought to behave isn't entitled to be considered normal. — Pierre-Normand

I think this is part of what I wanted to get at.

If I don't behave normally, I'm not entitled to be considered normal. But it need not be a pejorative thing. I think the healthy thing for a nonconformist to do is to accept that they aren't normal, rather than campaign to redefine normal. My sense is that this is a big part of what's going on.

Can you elaborate on what gender means to you? Expressions and impressions about what? Is my affinity for pinstripes part of my gender?

interesting, how do you think it can be exploited? — Mr Phil O'Sophy

As to lawyers, it represents an opportunity. We see it exploited already. Just do a Google search of "gender law." An example, I would think, would be in what I like to call the Lex Lavacrum, the "Law of the Bath(room)", i.e. the disputes arising out of the use and alleged misuse of gender-specific bathrooms. Then, there are the questions arising from disputes as to the rights of transgender or transsexual people (e.g., serving in the military); whether the law should recognize the "third gender" option. Much money to be made by enterprising lawyers--Thar's gold in them thar genders.

As to academia, gender is and no doubt has been for some time the subject matter of courses historical, psychological, anthropological, sociological. You'll find academic journals devoted to gender, I'm sure. As to pundits and politicians, what do they do but exploit controversial issues? Gender certainly is one of them. Positions on gender will generate popularity, publicity, funding and votes.

So you don't think sex and gender are synonymous? Is gender is a social construct? — bloodninja

I think they used to be synonymous but have drifted apart. And I suspect gender is a poorly defined fraught concept now, post-drift. Trying to sort it out.

I understand where you're coming from. I think the cognitive dissonance stems from an attempt to reconcile multiple narratives about these issues. It's sometimes easy to mistake two separate positions for the same thing due to the overlapping themes. In addition to that, many of these positions seem internally inconsistent. I've been picking up on a certain recurring theme: anti-something positions that sneakily presuppose the something they're attacking.

perhaps the difference between sex and gender is the same as the difference between ethnicity and race? In any case, it seems to me obvious that gender is how one's biological sex is taken up and acted out (roles) within society. Gender is largely determined through the social possibilities available to one's biological sex and you don't have to be a genius to see that these possibilities are changing all the time.

physiology normally defines one's behavior — Harry Hindu

Whether that's the case is the big question that is nowhere near answered - to what extent human sexual stereotypical behaviour is based on genes vs how they were raised. We can't learn much from other animals because those that are social enough to have a culture will have the same dilemma. We can learn from observing sexual differentiation of behaviour in non-social animals, but it's hard to draw any inferences from that to humans, since non-social animals are much more different from humans than the social ones (eg all the great apes are social (actually, I'm not sure about orang-utans. Are they social?)).

But even if it were to be conclusively demonstrated that genes make boys enjoy playing rugby more than girls, I would like to live in a world where girls are allowed to play rugby, and are not looked down on, or regarded as 'not a proper girl' for doing so.

I think this is part of what I wanted to get at.

If I don't behave normally, I'm not entitled to be considered normal. But it need not be a pejorative thing. I think the healthy thing for a nonconformist to do is to accept that they aren't normal, rather than campaign to redefine normal. My sense is that this is a big part of what's going on. — Roke

The trouble is that people don't usually go around qualifying other people's behaviors as "normal" or "abnormal" in a totally dispassionate and/or merely descriptive or statistical way. If this were the case, we could say of an American citizen who speaks both Chinese and Russian that she is highly abnormal.

Also, if someone is gay or transgender, say, and demands not be treated as an abnormal person, it would be very disingenuous to interpret her as saying, foolishly, that her specific case represents a statistical norm: that a large majority of women are gay, or that a large majority of people born with XY chromosomes are females, and hence that she is normal in that sense. Rather, what she is saying is: to hell with norms. Merely statistical of biological norms aren't normative in any kind of moral sense.

Can you elaborate on what gender means to you? Expressions and impressions about what? Is my affinity for pinstripes part of my gender? — Roke

"Gender" means reference to an aspect of identity. Identity is both expressed and impressed upon us -- it is expressed socially and expressed to ourselves. It is impressed socially and also impressed by our self. So when a person expresses masculine traits to the world they are expressing an aspect of their gender which is an aspect of their identity. But they can also express these traits to themselves: reflecting upon how, as a man, they feel that....

And we are also impressed by others as well as ourselves. We are impressed, as men, to... ; we are impressed by our self to act as...

I think identity has this two by two aspect where it is expressed and impressed, and that expression is to others/self, where impressions is from others/self.

As to whether your affinity for pinstripes is part of your gender, I'd ask -- how do you feel about it?

What particular characteristics have varied so much so as to completely disregard gender roles? — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Gender roles aren't disregarded, gender roles change as society changes and our shared understanding of being changes. An interesting Marxist take on our changing gender roles would locate the main source of this 'ideological' change in the ever 'evolving' technological infrastructure.

has there not always been the two separate spheres of being in each culture and time? — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Sorry I don't really understand this. By being do you mean gender?

I would have to agree. I still maintain that our shared understanding of gender changes with our shared understanding of being however.

Regardless of society and culture mostly throughout history was there not always a distinction in the roles of the two sexes — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Was there? I would be surprised if there were not some cultures in which men and women performed the same roles in everything except those things that only one was equipped to do by virtue of their sex, eg breast-feeding.

We'd need to ask some anthropologists.

We'd need to ask some anthropologists. — andrewk

No, we just furiously type whatever we 'reckon' don't we?