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One of the problems while debating misguided 3rd wavers, or gender/qu**r activists is that lack of definitional rigour when it comes to the terms ‘sex’ and ‘gender’. What is chilling is that these activists often refuse to define their terms, yet as demonstrated here in Canada want these same terms enshrined into Canadian law. Obviously, this should not happen if clear guidelines and expectations are supposed to be part of our legislative goals.
Canadian focus aside, lets look at Auntie Wanda and krismichelle429 tackle the situation of defining sex and gender in a more general sense.
“In my experience talking to gender/qu**r activists, when they say “sex,” they can mean either “the biological differences between men and women” or “the behaviors that society expects from each sex,” or both at the same time. When they say “gender,” they can mean either “personality” or “the behaviors that society expects from each sex” or “the biological differences between men and women,” or all three at the same time. Oftentimes they switch between definitions without telling you, and then expect you to read their mind and just know which meaning they’re using at that moment. And no matter how many times you explain your definitions to them, they never acknowledge it and choose instead to project their definitions onto your words (or to put it more simply: they hear what they want to hear instead of what you’re saying).
Like, we have explained our definitions of “sex” and “gender” thousands of times on this site. We have used them clearly and consistently. We don’t change them. When gender critical feminists use the word “sex,” it ALWAYS refers to the biological differences between sexes. When we say “gender,” it ALWAYS refers to the behaviors forced on men and women by a sexist society.
And yet, we constantly get into arguments with gender/qu**r activists who think we believe that sexist expectations for behavior are biological. We have to explain that we don’t over and over and over again, even though we’ve been very clear about our beliefs and definitions, even though those beliefs and definitions have not changed since we last explained them 5 minutes ago. And that’s because when we say “sex” and “gender,” gender/qu**r activists hear their own definitions instead of ours, and because the words “sex” and “gender” can mean absolutely anything to them, they can hear anything that they want to hear.
Oftentimes they switch between definitions without telling you, and then expect you to read their mind and just know which meaning they’re using at that moment. And no matter how many times you explain your definitions to them, they never acknowledge it and choose instead to project their definitions onto your words (or to put it more simply: they hear what they want to hear instead of what you’re saying).”
– See the whole post on [Blackswallowtailbutterfly].
How weird is it that such basic concepts can cause so much furor? It is almost like a certain category of men have decided they strongly dislike a particular objective fact, and expect the rest of the world to fall in line with their new orthodoxy (because they say so). Conveniently, when it come to basic biological definitions, all of their the hard-headed skepticism and critical analysis is tucked away. However, the critical thinking boom is lowered almost instantaneously to repudiate those quaint feminist notions of sex-based oppression, patriarchy, and rape culture – now there friends, are some legitimate topics for serious Debate (because we disagree with them and it doesn’t affect us much)!
http://auntiewanda.tumblr.com/post/150750143211/terf-receipts-auntiewanda-terf-receipts
If there is a better description that leads to a more accurate description of objective reality let’s hear it. Until that time, and with general scientific consensus, the current definitions look pretty rock-solid to me.
Notes from the gender debate that is ongoing in society. I think that the sooner we recognize that gender is a harmful social construct and move toward removing it from society, the better off we’ll be.
http://auntiewanda.tumblr.com/post/151164241261/sassysublimetastemaker-girlsmoonsandstars
Ms. Reilly-Cooper has done some fantastic foundational work describing what sex and gender is and, more importantly, how many radical feminists approach the topic.
This will be a long post and a feature here at DWR as it is a resource too good not to replicate.
“Sex
1. Humans, like the vast majority of species, reproduce sexually. This means that the reproduction of our species is achieved through the fusion of a female gamete with a male gamete to produce a new organism. In normal cases, each organism produced will be unambiguously either female or male, and will produce the appropriate gametes for the purposes of sexual reproduction.
2. The categories of female and male are thus general biological categories that apply to all species that reproduce sexually. Humans are not special in this regard. While the language we use to describe these biological facts, and the values we attach to these facts, will be shaped by culture, the facts themselves exist independently of culture or our social understandings of them. Whether or not we have the language with which to describe it, females will continue to produce large, non-motile gametes (ova), and males will continue to produce small, motile gametes (spermatozoa).
3. Humans, like the majority of species and like all mammals, are sexually dimorphic. This means that female and male organisms of the same species are distinguishable from one another, due to differences in their anatomy and physiology: their primary and secondary sex characteristics. In female humans, relatively higher levels of oestrogen will lead to the development of a vulva, vagina, ovaries, uterus, breasts, and a range of other physiological markers. In male humans, relatively higher levels of testosterone will lead to the development of a penis and testes, deepening of the voice and growth of facial hair at puberty, and a range of other physiological markers. Again, humans are not special in this regard. While the language we use to describe these biological facts and the values we attach to them will vary with culture, the facts themselves exist independently of culture or our social understandings of them. Whether or not we have the language with which to describe it, at puberty female humans will begin to develop breasts and to menstruate.
4. As mentioned in point 1, in normal cases, the child that is born as a result of human reproduction is unambiguously female or male and easily recognised as such, as a result of the visible sex organs that develop in utero. In a small percentage of cases, the child is intersex. This means that the sexual characteristics the child displays are such that it is not possible to make a simple classification of female or male. While it is difficult to make a clear determination on the prevalence of intersex conditions, due to the range of different biological factors that may cause it, it is estimated that around one in 2,000 children will be born visibly intersex. The fact that some humans are intersex in no way diminishes the truth of sexual dimorphism, any more than the fact that some humans are born missing lower limbs diminishes the truth of the statement that humans are bipedal.
5. In all of those cases where the child is unambiguously female or male, the biological sex of the child is recognised at birth: female children are called girls, male children are called boys. Correctly identifying the genitals that a child possesses and therefore the biological sex to which they belong is not a matter of assigning gender to the child; it is simply to recognise the biological facts and to give them the correct biological label. Whether or not we have the language with which to describe it, male and female humans will exist. Children with vulvas will continue to be born, and children with penis and testes will continue to be born, whether or not we call them girls and boys (and whether or not we call those organs by those labels. A penis is anatomically a different organ from a clitoris, no matter what name you give it).
6. To summarise points 1-5: despite the existence of some unusual cases that deviate from the norm, the vast majority of humans possess the anatomical characteristics of either one sex or the other. These characteristics determine the reproductive function the individual can go on to perform. Biologists use the labels female and male to refer to these sex classes. Whether we retain these labels to refer to these sex classes, or whether we allow those labels to be co-opted to mean other things and thereby lose our language to describe these basic biological facts, these basic biological facts will remain. Every human being that has ever existed was created through this mechanism, and it took a lot of arduous and dangerous reproductive labour on the part of their mothers to get them here.
7. There is nothing remotely oppressive or unjust about correctly labelling a child’s biological sex on the basis of their genitals, and therefore correctly identifying their potential reproductive role. Neither is there anything essentialist or determinist about this classification. To acknowledge that on the basis of their biology, only one half of our species is potentially capable of conceiving and gestating live young, neither reduces female persons to that reproductive function, nor prescribes it as necessary for them. However, to deny this basic biological fact renders female biology unspeakable, which in turn makes it impossible to describe and analyse the oppression that accompanies living in a female body (such as rape and sexual violence, lack of access to contraception and abortion, provision of maternity healthcare and maternity employment rights, lack of investment and research into female illnesses and diseases…)
8. Women’s oppression has its historical roots and its ostensible justification in female biology and the exploitation of female reproductive labour. Altering the definition of the word ‘female’ so that it now means ‘any person who believes themselves to be female’ is not only conceptually incoherent (more on this in a later post); it also removes the possibility of analysing the structural oppression of female persons as a class, by eradicating the terminology we use to describe the material conditions of their existence. (Bookmark that link for later if you must, but do read it. Read it more than once, ideally. It’s worth it.)
9. Furthermore, for those who feel strongly that they should have been born female but were not, changing the definition of the word female so that it also applies to them will bring only a temporary alleviation of their suffering. It is not the existence of the words ‘female’ and ‘male’ that persons with dysphoria find distressing. It is the underlying biological facts to which they refer, as well as the socially constructed gender roles that are associated with being a member of that sex class, that they find intolerable. Neither of these sources of pain will be remedied by changing the label we use to refer to them. The words female and male are neutral descriptors, and there is nothing pejorative about being classified as male. Any negative connotations the words female and male bring to mind are caused by the social construction of gender norms associated with the sexes, in the form of femininity and masculinity; this will be the subject of the next post.”
Every once and awhile something good bubbles up from the seething mass known as tumblr. This is a good summary of what sex and gender are and how they interact in our society.
“It seems like on here at tumblr there’s a lot of misinformation going around. people are using sex and gender interchangeably as if they mean the same thing. There’s a lot of unclear information and everything seems rally vague and distorted so the goal of this post is to help clear some of this up.
What are the differences between sex and gender?
The main difference is that sex describes your body’s biological reproductive role. Humans as a species reproduce sexually, as opposed to species which reproduce asexually, such as by budding. In human reproduction, a sperm cell will fertilize an egg cell and cause a pregnancy.
We call people whose biology designated them to be sperm depositors “male” and we call people who are designed by biology to be pregnancy carriers “female”. That is all these terms mean, they reference what role we would play in reproduction if we decided to produce offspring.
Gender on the other hand, is a big mass of controversy. See, unlike biological sex, gender is not innate. We are not born with a gender. Gender is a social construct–that means it only exists as long as society propagates it.
What is gender?
Gender is an oppressive force that dictates to people how they should behave, dress, act, what their role in life is, how to interact with other people, etc.. While specific gender roles and norms vary from culture to culture, in every culture, gender exists to tell people how to live, and it is always oppressive.
Gender is a hierarchy which places males above females. Gendered interaction dictates that women defer to men, that men are taken more seriously, that men are more credible, that men are treated as superior.
In our society, femininity is the gender role forced on to women, and masculinity is the gender role forced on to men. We also label objects and clothes and behaviors as “feminine” or “masculine” based on how these objects are linked to oppressive gender roles.
Why is femininity oppressive?
From the day we are born, female people are forced against our will in to the gender role of femininity. People will immediately begin to judge this tiny human, telling her she is “cute” and “pretty”. Even as she is first learning language and what words mean, she is also learning that it is rewarding to be “pretty” and that she receives praise for it. She will learn this way, since her birth, that her value as a person is determined by her visual appeal to others.
There is much literature written on the oppressive nature of femininity. In short, femininity is how society tells women to behave. Femininity is policing one’s appearance as if we are a visual object, paying rent in beauty just to exist in the world. Femininity is in our meekness, our smallness, how we are trained to put ourselves second and put men especially first, to be accommodating, to accept disrespect from men, to not have boundaries lest we insult men, to put male feelings above our own safety and bodily autonomy.
Femininity is not innate to women. It is something we are taught, something we are forced in to. Women do not naturally behave meekly, we are not born wanting to put make up on our faces.
The idea that gender is innate oppresses women.
Historically, women have been told that femininity, this forced gender role of being innate and subservient and meek and stupid and focused on vanity/appearance, is actually a biological innate part of who we are and is exactly what makes us women.
This idea, that femininity is natural to women, has been used to keep us out of science, to keep us oppressed housewives, because that is all that gender dictates we are good for (remember, gender is a hierarchy which tells you how to live).
Gender is obviously not innate–the existence of feral children, generally cases of extreme negligence, illustrates to us just how gender is something we are taught and not something we are born with. Women are not born with the idea that they must shave their legs and be meek and accommodating to men. This is not natural to us. Gender oppresses us.
Gender is an oppressive belief system and buying in to it continues the oppression of women.
The solution is gender abolition. If we abolish gender, nobody would be told how to live, what to wear, or how to behave. There would be no hierarchy placing males above females. Biological sex would continue to exist, because it is something made by evolution and required for reproduction of our species. But gender, the idea that your biological sex says anything about your personality, would not exist.
Males and females would each be permitted to have any kind of personality.
We would not needlessly assign femininity or masculinity to hobbies or toys or any other objects in order to limit peoples’ interests. Everyone could be free to be who they truly are, without oppressive gender labels telling people how to live.
Abolishing gender is best for everyone involved, and also liberates women from the oppressive system of gender.”
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
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