Lab
See how this opinion breaks down by gender, political spectrum and generation — and who shares your view.
Gender
12 comments
Evidently so.
Even if you think it's ridiculous, you gotta admit, there's some seriously gender bendy folks walkin around here, and they are 100% serious about their gender identity.
(Shit, is the term "gender bender" intrinsically offensive? I have no idea lmao)
There's some people who seriously believe that the government are all reptilian aliens, that doesn't make it evidently true
Gender-fluid is a form of gender identity or expression, rather than sexual orientation.
A gender-fluid person is when a person’s gender changes over time; they might identify as a male one day and a female the next. They could also identify as nonbinary identities and there is no specific time frame that this change can happen in.
This differs from gender-neutral which is a term often used to describe people of any gender.
While there are distinct biological differences between males and females, gender, in terms of what people identify and as a social concept, is fluid.
• As gender is not necessarily dependent on biological characteristics, it cannot be fixed.
• Identifying your gender as being female or male can be about how you feel and therefore this could change over time.
• Support for gender fluidity is reflected in many organisations now asking for people’s pronouns and accepting gender-neutral pronouns, rather than just making presumptions by people’s appearance.
• As this article demonstrates, young people are increasingly challenging conventional gender stereotypes as in a recent survey by Fusion, half of millennials in the US agreed that gender isn’t limited to just male and female.
Is gender fixed or fluctuating?
• Gender is a concept that we use to interpret who we and other people are. It is a social construct that relates characteristics, behaviours, societal roles, and other forms of self-expression to labels based on a binary of the masculine and feminine. At birth, we are usually assigned gender in correspondence to our biological sex, which in most (but not all) cases is male or female.
• In the Western world, we have historically understood gender through binary terms – however, many argue that this is not the extent of gender. Many people understand and experience gender outside of the traditional binary, and imagine gender as a fluid spectrum.
• Many believe that gender is not fixed but fluid, and fluctuates over time. Some people may at times feel more affinity to a certain gender identity than another, or the way they express their gender might change.
• Some people identify as gender-fluid, which means that they do not have a single gender but fluctuate between many. Some days they may feel more masculine, and on other days more feminine.
• Others argue that gender is not fluid, often because they interpret gender as synonymous with sex and determined by physical characteristics. Proponents of this view may argue that gender is fixed because you are born a certain way.
• However, others would oppose this argument by distinguishing ‘sex’ as relating to our physical characteristics and ‘gender’ as relating to our identities and sociocultural roles in society. Many argue that sex itself is fluid, proven by the existence of intersex people and the physical changes that transgender people experience when transitioning.
Perception isn't always reality. Gender and birth sex are synonymous terms. Despite what the APA currently claims, gender dysphoria and/or sexual disorientation are treatable disorders.
They're treated by transitioning. Everyone who makes this argument seems to act like an armchair psychologist and clearly hasn't done research on the history of trans mental healthcare. Transitioning has always been the most effective treatment of dysphoria, along with social support.
By that logic body integrity dysphoria is treated by hacking a limb off
Or there are different treatments for different conditions. Even if two conditions might seem similar, doesn't mean they should be treated similarly. There's nuance to different conditions and rather than making blanket judgements about how to think of all conditions, we should reach an understanding and figure out what works best.
But you're making a blanket judgement about how everyone's an armchair psychologist because they don't reach the same conclusion you do.
If you know a lot about a subject and read through a lot of arguments online about that subject that use none of the data that already exists out there, you get the feeling that they don't know what they're talking about and they're not using the same data. It has nothing to do with the conclusion and everything to do with the understanding of the subject.
It's fair IMO to say most people will have opinions that aren't based in reading studies and evidence on the topic. I think it's less so a blanket judgement and more so the idea that there are fewer people who are well-read on something that doesn't concern most people like the history of trans health. But they'll still have an opinion on it. I think it's dishonest to suggest that everyone making judgements about trans people (negative or positive) are also well-read about these subjects, because they really aren't.
No need to generalise a bunch of people like that, remember it's about the opinions here and not the people. Of course the mod won't stick up for the website's own rules on this one because they agree with you.
Make the case or invite a friend to comment!