Forums → WEPR → Gender Identity
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Imma throw 2 cents in and run away for a while b/c med school integrated exams and stuff, so.... hold on to ya butts. It's mostly me rambling about a pseudo related issue to the current topic... so, sorry to all of you who don't like that or won't like my thoughts
When it comes to subjects such as this I think people neglect to acknowledge (or they just don't know) that there are different models/systems/lenses by which the information is compiled and viewed through. A lot of the arguments I've seen revolve almost solely on two parties arguing things seen through different lenses which means that the people use the same words but they don't mean the same things.... so its like a semantical tornado of never getting anywhere. You can hardly place certain views as "truths" just because they make sense under the model you've bought into. Different psychologists say different things all of the time... so just because a few people have come in and tried to redefine certain words doesn't make the classical definitions wrong. Every verbal picture must be painted on the canvas of context or it starts dabbling in the realm of just making a pointless mess.
I feel that the model that says that gender = sex is the more concise and efficient of the two. Gender identity comes across as a better means of expressing the mental association one takes with a specific set of (what seem to be) preconceived psychosocial norms for what they think they are. For all those stuck in the gray area of sexual maldevelopment those disorders all have specific names that describe them and those terms can and are used to describe their exact characteristics/problems making a seemingly decent substitution for the hermaphrodite and others.
I just have difficulty with accepting the other way of thinking because it isn't very objective in my eyes... unless the sole action of someone saying they are something dictates that they are in fact that something qualifies as objective. The gender identity norms are all socially constructed and are apt to change from culture to culture. You can't standardize what it means to psychologically identify as a man or woman. The names for whatever category you put yourself into have no value or significance at that point. They are not descriptive and they are not scientific. Maybe this is just me forcing my beliefs onto the realm of science, but the value of a label isn't in making yourself feel better... it's in streamlining information and making something understandable to others. A field of science is a field of science... it's not inherently an outlet for making you feel better about the genetic lottery ticket you bought on your way into the world.
If I say that my gender is tree, then what does that mean? I think it, I believe it, I am it! But I'm not a tree. I'm a human male who has thrust his opinion of what he thinks a tree is onto all of treedom... and if all I've done is simply say that I am a tree without forcing my idea of what that treentails onto the world, then all I'm doing is saying words that, like I said earlier, have little to no descriptional value. AND if they're not going to have any value, then it's not really a scientific explanation of something and not science. You have to objectively fall into the category, you don't just get to pick. Some of the girliest guys (it's a trap!) you can find will identify as men and some of the burliest guys will identify as women. The model that reconciles with the burly guys' gender/sex disgruntlement is in fact a model, but it does nothing but reconciliation. There's seemingly no value in the labels and it just makes the whole ordeal more complicated and convoluted than the model I subscribe to. I can't look through those particular lenses because everything is too blurry without any definitive lines tracing the objects so as to actually be seen and differentiated from the surroundings.
Even if we find out something in the brain that's specific to this particular occurrence exists in these people I still say their sex/gender should be male but psychologically they're female. If you're going to use alternate definitions, then you should make the context and actual meaning known, so that what you're talking about is at least clear.
just thought I'd stir up the mud a little bit 