Chromosomes are just another appearance. Like hair, body parts,genitals, etc., they are a biological trait reported to entail sex. One which might be subject to change. We and cut or grow our hair, cut off or remodel genitals, potentially some effect might change or remove a chromosomes too. They are no better as ground to sex.
If someone’s Y chromosomes suddenly dropped off tomorrow, would they cease to be a man? Hardly the stable quality of an identity. The trouble with supposing one is made into an identity by possessing particular traits, if the identity is then equivalent to those traits. If the trait goes, so does they identity, at least by the story being told. Sex by chromosome is another one of those shallow appearance stories, like the hair and genitals before it.
Have or alter your body this way, change your traits, and you will finally belong to your identity. The supposition identity is not grounded in itself. We must consume thing to be part of the team. Just buy the right drug, alter yourself the right way, you will finally be your meaningful self. When you finally take on the appearance of a man or women, you will be one.
The great irony in the consternation over “fluid” sex is it is the
essentialist who believes, above all, it is fluid. Since they cite a trait external to identity defines it, the spectre of fluidity is always haunting. If the trait changes, if the appearance changes, so must their identity. Essential relation between identity and appearance doesn’t allow for a man without a penis to be a man, a person with long hair to be a man, a person without XY chromosomes, etc., the essentialist is always in fear of finite whim destroying sex because sex does not extend past appearance for them. It’s only ever about having the right kind of hair, genitals, chromosomes, iPhone, Apple Watch, car or house. The essentialist is the one who goes shopping for a sex or gender, taking one to be buying the right product in the social space. For them, sex is only looking a part, possessing the right sort of things. Lose the look, you lose the sex.
When I say sex lies deeper, I mean it is defined separately to one's appearance (e.g. hair length, genitals, a particular chromosome or not), in terms of one’s sex itself. It is not a status obtained by having one sort of appearance or another, but a substantial feature itself. Changing one’s appearance has no impact on their sex. Grow a man’s hair, he is still a man. Cut off a man’s genitals, he is still a man. Eliminate man’s Y chromosome, he is still a man. Sex, being identity of whole, holds across changes to other aspects of that whole. Similarly, give a woman short hair, she is still a woman. Change a woman’s genitals, she is still a woman. Give a woman a Y chromosome, she is still a woman.
The unity of identity applies just as much to the (trans) woman. If the woman appears with a penis, no breasts, etc., she is still a woman. If she appears with breasts and a penis, she is still a woman. If she appears with breasts and a vaginoplasty, she is still a woman. If she appears wth XY chromosomes, she is still a woman. Sex is not a game of obtaining or changing by buying appearances. To have a sex (or change a sex) depends on an attribute of sex itself.
In this respect,
trans identity is an illusion. It only makes sense in reference to shallow appearance identifications of sex— that someone who looked like they should be a man is a woman or vice verse. When we understand the deeper truth of sex itself, the idea of trans no longer makes any sense. Appearance doesn’t give any definition of sex. Any sex might be given with any appearance. There is no longer “woman who looks like a man” or a “man who looks like a woman.” Just men, women, and anyone else, with the unity of their sex itself, however they appear.
Properly stated, a trans woman is
just a woman, many of whom never actually changed sex at all (they were a woman all along, just misread by those who thought women only appeared a certain way), with a different appearance (e.g. hair length, genitals, chromosomes) to some other women.