If gender is a social construct, what about age?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gender is not a social construct. It's established at the moment of conception. I don't care who you love but don't insist that male is female or vice versa.

Not even sex is established at the moment of conception, for all human beings. Typically it is, but not universally.

https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/001669.htm
https://repeatingislands.com/2015/09/19/the-astonishing-village-where-little-girls-turn-into-boys-aged-12/

And then there are the other organisms:

https://www.nature.com/articles/296850a0
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK9989/
http://news.berkeley.edu/2010/03/01/frogs/

Yeah. Because how the sex of alligators is determined is completely relevant to this discussion. As are genetic anomalies.

Human beings are relevant to the discussion, no? Sex is established at the moment of conception for human beings, except for when it isn't.

You ignored PP's sentence 'as are genetic anomolies.' Because that is what is happening if sex can't be determined at birth.

So these human beings don't count as human beings? I think that they do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

The gender thing. Take princesses and puppy dog tails out of the equation and gender isn't REALLY a social construct. It is a biological construct. The nurturing nature of women IS something that society drills into us but it is ALSO something we're biologically predisposed to in order to have our children survive. Men's aggressiveness IS something that society drills in but it is ALSO biologically driven as it sets them up to get a woman to agree to mate with him and then to protect her and their mates. To extract these things is to ignore human biology.

What about women's aggressiveness and men's nurturing? Don't women have to compete for men? Don't men have an interest in having their children survive? We aren't a species where the male contributes sperm and then goes off. We're a species where both parents have to commit to child-rearing over many years in order to have offspring that survive to adulthood and reproduction.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with pp about age/middle age and sex/gender analogy. But I think the big difference there is that virtually everyone experiences the age one. I am 33 and frequently thinking, 'my mom was this old when I was 8' and realizing that adults are just people, nothing special. We all go through this age/expectation thing.

The gender thing. Take princesses and puppy dog tails out of the equation and gender isn't REALLY a social construct. It is a biological construct. The nurturing nature of women IS something that society drills into us but it is ALSO something we're biologically predisposed to in order to have our children survive. Men's aggressiveness IS something that society drills in but it is ALSO biologically driven as it sets them up to get a woman to agree to mate with him and then to protect her and their mates. To extract these things is to ignore human biology.

I believe transgendered people exist and I think they should be allowed to live their lives in unmolested unquestioned harmony because they do no harm whatsoever. But I do think they have some kind of body dysphoria type of mental illness. One that can be cured by allowing them to transition so go for it! But the reality is that the vast vast majority of humans are not going through this. They may hate 'girly' or 'manly' things but they are biologically normal and are the man/woman they appeared to be at birth.

I think the current trend of conflating whether it is 'ok' to be transgendered with whether this is common or normal is not the right way to go. It is not normal and it is a medical condition that sometimes requires intense surgical medical intervention. I wish the people who want everyone on the transgender train would cool it a bit because I think we'll lose the war trying to fight that type of thing and I wish the people who are so intolerant towards transgenderism could simply acknowledge it as a mental illness and walk away and stop thinking about it so much.

And don't tell me you could ignore it if it wasn't for the bathroom stuff. Are you worried about little boys alone in the men's restroom? That is a ridiculous non issue that actually will improve a lot of people's lives. Children will be SAFER being able to enter any bathroom with either parent.

I think that after millenia of socially constructed gender expectations (w/r/t nurturing and aggressiveness), it is difficult to separate what has been conditioned over many generations from what is biologically inherent. I think that what you associate with a particular age is largely dependent on what your own experiences have been. People whose experiences lie outside the norm will always see things differently than people whose experiences fall within the norm.

I think that talking about a biological/social construct for behaviors that have been ingrained in humans for a millenia is semantics. Behaviors ingrained for millenia are there for biological reasons. It is probably a social construct that we're afraid of snakes, but it is now a subconscious trait of humans BECAUSE snakes killed a bunch of us.

What do you want from people WRT trans gendered people beyond acceptance? Genuinely asking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

The gender thing. Take princesses and puppy dog tails out of the equation and gender isn't REALLY a social construct. It is a biological construct. The nurturing nature of women IS something that society drills into us but it is ALSO something we're biologically predisposed to in order to have our children survive. Men's aggressiveness IS something that society drills in but it is ALSO biologically driven as it sets them up to get a woman to agree to mate with him and then to protect her and their mates. To extract these things is to ignore human biology.

What about women's aggressiveness and men's nurturing? Don't women have to compete for men? Don't men have an interest in having their children survive? We aren't a species where the male contributes sperm and then goes off. We're a species where both parents have to commit to child-rearing over many years in order to have offspring that survive to adulthood and reproduction.

I think you did not understand my post. I did not intend those two rather stereotypical examples to define all women and men. I was simply saying that a lot of behaviors and differences that people want to label as 'social constructs' are actually pretty ingrained in human-ness due to biological reasons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

The gender thing. Take princesses and puppy dog tails out of the equation and gender isn't REALLY a social construct. It is a biological construct. The nurturing nature of women IS something that society drills into us but it is ALSO something we're biologically predisposed to in order to have our children survive. Men's aggressiveness IS something that society drills in but it is ALSO biologically driven as it sets them up to get a woman to agree to mate with him and then to protect her and their mates. To extract these things is to ignore human biology.

What about women's aggressiveness and men's nurturing? Don't women have to compete for men? Don't men have an interest in having their children survive? We aren't a species where the male contributes sperm and then goes off. We're a species where both parents have to commit to child-rearing over many years in order to have offspring that survive to adulthood and reproduction.

I think you did not understand my post. I did not intend those two rather stereotypical examples to define all women and men. I was simply saying that a lot of behaviors and differences that people want to label as 'social constructs' are actually pretty ingrained in human-ness due to biological reasons.

Yes, in human-ness, exactly. And yet we expect women (but not men) to be nurturing and men (but not women) to be aggressive. That's the social-construct part.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with pp about age/middle age and sex/gender analogy. But I think the big difference there is that virtually everyone experiences the age one. I am 33 and frequently thinking, 'my mom was this old when I was 8' and realizing that adults are just people, nothing special. We all go through this age/expectation thing.

The gender thing. Take princesses and puppy dog tails out of the equation and gender isn't REALLY a social construct. It is a biological construct. The nurturing nature of women IS something that society drills into us but it is ALSO something we're biologically predisposed to in order to have our children survive. Men's aggressiveness IS something that society drills in but it is ALSO biologically driven as it sets them up to get a woman to agree to mate with him and then to protect her and their mates. To extract these things is to ignore human biology.

I believe transgendered people exist and I think they should be allowed to live their lives in unmolested unquestioned harmony because they do no harm whatsoever. But I do think they have some kind of body dysphoria type of mental illness. One that can be cured by allowing them to transition so go for it! But the reality is that the vast vast majority of humans are not going through this. They may hate 'girly' or 'manly' things but they are biologically normal and are the man/woman they appeared to be at birth.

I think the current trend of conflating whether it is 'ok' to be transgendered with whether this is common or normal is not the right way to go. It is not normal and it is a medical condition that sometimes requires intense surgical medical intervention. I wish the people who want everyone on the transgender train would cool it a bit because I think we'll lose the war trying to fight that type of thing and I wish the people who are so intolerant towards transgenderism could simply acknowledge it as a mental illness and walk away and stop thinking about it so much.

And don't tell me you could ignore it if it wasn't for the bathroom stuff. Are you worried about little boys alone in the men's restroom? That is a ridiculous non issue that actually will improve a lot of people's lives. Children will be SAFER being able to enter any bathroom with either parent.

I think that after millenia of socially constructed gender expectations (w/r/t nurturing and aggressiveness), it is difficult to separate what has been conditioned over many generations from what is biologically inherent. I think that what you associate with a particular age is largely dependent on what your own experiences have been. People whose experiences lie outside the norm will always see things differently than people whose experiences fall within the norm.

I think that talking about a biological/social construct for behaviors that have been ingrained in humans for a millenia is semantics. Behaviors ingrained for millenia are there for biological reasons. It is probably a social construct that we're afraid of snakes, but it is now a subconscious trait of humans BECAUSE snakes killed a bunch of us.

What do you want from people WRT trans gendered people beyond acceptance? Genuinely asking.

Actual acceptance! For it to be easier for transgender people to navigate every day life comfortably. For laws not to be passed that discriminate against them. For them not to be labeled as mentally ill. For their reality not to be mocked by people like OP. We still have a long way to go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gender is not a social construct. It's established at the moment of conception. I don't care who you love but don't insist that male is female or vice versa.

Not even sex is established at the moment of conception, for all human beings. Typically it is, but not universally.

https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/001669.htm
https://repeatingislands.com/2015/09/19/the-astonishing-village-where-little-girls-turn-into-boys-aged-12/

And then there are the other organisms:

https://www.nature.com/articles/296850a0
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK9989/
http://news.berkeley.edu/2010/03/01/frogs/

Yeah. Because how the sex of alligators is determined is completely relevant to this discussion. As are genetic anomalies.

Human beings are relevant to the discussion, no? Sex is established at the moment of conception for human beings, except for when it isn't.

You ignored PP's sentence 'as are genetic anomolies.' Because that is what is happening if sex can't be determined at birth.

So these human beings don't count as human beings? I think that they do.

Of course they do. All people with disabilities and medical conditions are considered people worthy of equal respect. That doesn't mean their condition says anything other than that they have a genetic anomaly. If you have an anomaly in your heart it doesn't speak to a larger question about whether there is a 'right' kind of heart. There is a right kind of heart that functions in an ideal way for human thriving and survival. The same is true for gender/sex. It doesn't mean there is ANYTHING wrong with people with heart defects or gender dysphoria.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Of course they do. All people with disabilities and medical conditions are considered people worthy of equal respect. That doesn't mean their condition says anything other than that they have a genetic anomaly. If you have an anomaly in your heart it doesn't speak to a larger question about whether there is a 'right' kind of heart. There is a right kind of heart that functions in an ideal way for human thriving and survival. The same is true for gender/sex. It doesn't mean there is ANYTHING wrong with people with heart defects or gender dysphoria.

Human beings have two legs! Except for the ones who don't.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Of course they do. All people with disabilities and medical conditions are considered people worthy of equal respect. That doesn't mean their condition says anything other than that they have a genetic anomaly. If you have an anomaly in your heart it doesn't speak to a larger question about whether there is a 'right' kind of heart. There is a right kind of heart that functions in an ideal way for human thriving and survival. The same is true for gender/sex. It doesn't mean there is ANYTHING wrong with people with heart defects or gender dysphoria.

Human beings have two legs! Except for the ones who don't.

And no one would/should say anything bad about someone with one leg or some other situation, but they also would acknowledge that two legs is the biologically/evoluntionarily normal human condition.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Of course they do. All people with disabilities and medical conditions are considered people worthy of equal respect. That doesn't mean their condition says anything other than that they have a genetic anomaly. If you have an anomaly in your heart it doesn't speak to a larger question about whether there is a 'right' kind of heart. There is a right kind of heart that functions in an ideal way for human thriving and survival. The same is true for gender/sex. It doesn't mean there is ANYTHING wrong with people with heart defects or gender dysphoria.

Human beings have two legs! Except for the ones who don't.

And no one would/should say anything bad about someone with one leg or some other situation, but they also would acknowledge that two legs is the biologically/evoluntionarily normal human condition.

Note the meaningful distinction between "Most human beings have two legs" and "Human beings have two legs".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Isn't that the argument pedophiles use? No. Age is not a social construct. Gross dude.

Yeah, no. This only makes sense to pedophiles.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Of course they do. All people with disabilities and medical conditions are considered people worthy of equal respect. That doesn't mean their condition says anything other than that they have a genetic anomaly. If you have an anomaly in your heart it doesn't speak to a larger question about whether there is a 'right' kind of heart. There is a right kind of heart that functions in an ideal way for human thriving and survival. The same is true for gender/sex. It doesn't mean there is ANYTHING wrong with people with heart defects or gender dysphoria.

Human beings have two legs! Except for the ones who don't.

And no one would/should say anything bad about someone with one leg or some other situation, but they also would acknowledge that two legs is the biologically/evoluntionarily normal human condition.

Note the meaningful distinction between "Most human beings have two legs" and "Human beings have two legs".

This is where it becomes ridiculous. Anyone who gets offended by someone saying 'human beings have two legs' is being ridiculous. Humans are supposed to have two legs. There are a multitude of reasons a specific human might not have two legs. Those reasons are all medical conditions based on accidents or genetic anomalies. Do you object to saying 'dogs have four legs'? Some dogs have three legs. But if you go around muddying the waters on everything then you can't say anything at all. When I teach my kid about humans and dogs I say, 'dogs have four legs and humans have two legs' and then you talk about exceptions as they arise or when you talk about handicapped people.

I am a liberal with a transgender cousin who I fully support in living her life they way she wants to live it, but I do not think that she is neurotypical or that her brain works in a way that the human brain is evolutionarily designed to work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Of course they do. All people with disabilities and medical conditions are considered people worthy of equal respect. That doesn't mean their condition says anything other than that they have a genetic anomaly. If you have an anomaly in your heart it doesn't speak to a larger question about whether there is a 'right' kind of heart. There is a right kind of heart that functions in an ideal way for human thriving and survival. The same is true for gender/sex. It doesn't mean there is ANYTHING wrong with people with heart defects or gender dysphoria.

Human beings have two legs! Except for the ones who don't.

And no one would/should say anything bad about someone with one leg or some other situation, but they also would acknowledge that two legs is the biologically/evoluntionarily normal human condition.

Note the meaningful distinction between "Most human beings have two legs" and "Human beings have two legs".

This is where it becomes ridiculous. Anyone who gets offended by someone saying 'human beings have two legs' is being ridiculous. Humans are supposed to have two legs. There are a multitude of reasons a specific human might not have two legs. Those reasons are all medical conditions based on accidents or genetic anomalies. Do you object to saying 'dogs have four legs'? Some dogs have three legs. But if you go around muddying the waters on everything then you can't say anything at all. When I teach my kid about humans and dogs I say, 'dogs have four legs and humans have two legs' and then you talk about exceptions as they arise or when you talk about handicapped people.

I am a liberal with a transgender cousin who I fully support in living her life they way she wants to live it, but I do not think that she is neurotypical or that her brain works in a way that the human brain is evolutionarily designed to work.

Bingo.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I love telling people my age because it’s always followed by holy crap, you look 30. OP celebrate your 30 looking self! If you need validity, try telling people your actual age and enjoy the compliments girl!

Yes, because you earned them through the genetic lottery.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Note the meaningful distinction between "Most human beings have two legs" and "Human beings have two legs".

This is where it becomes ridiculous. Anyone who gets offended by someone saying 'human beings have two legs' is being ridiculous. Humans are supposed to have two legs. There are a multitude of reasons a specific human might not have two legs. Those reasons are all medical conditions based on accidents or genetic anomalies. Do you object to saying 'dogs have four legs'? Some dogs have three legs. But if you go around muddying the waters on everything then you can't say anything at all. When I teach my kid about humans and dogs I say, 'dogs have four legs and humans have two legs' and then you talk about exceptions as they arise or when you talk about handicapped people.

I am a liberal with a transgender cousin who I fully support in living her life they way she wants to live it, but I do not think that she is neurotypical or that her brain works in a way that the human brain is evolutionarily designed to work.

I'm not saying that I'm offended. (This is because I'm not offended.) I'm saying that "Human beings have two legs" is a factually-incorrect statement.