Once again I ask: what's the big deal about gender?
Someone just blocked me for pointing out a couple of facts regarding sex and gender (see below).
What I did not get an answer to, before being blocked, is why these facts are so aggravating to people who want to insist that there is only male sex / male gender and female sex / female gender, end of story.
If you and everyone you know are 100% male or 100% female then why would it bother you if other people see life differently? To the point of repeating over and over that such people don't exist or are mentally ill? (The rulers of the Soviet Union also labelled people they disagreed with as mentally ill...)
Sigh...
Fact # 1: Anatomically not everyone is male/XY or female/XX. Here's a rather neutral medical article about some of the many variations that exist: https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/001669.htm
Fact # 2: There isn't a simple one-on-one match between physical sex and psychological or social gender. We don't have to talk about current trends and controversies at all; this goes way back in time in many part of the world. In India,the Hijras have been recognized as a third gender for centuries. Physically, they include intersex people, castrated people, and others. In quite a number of Indigenous North American cultures, going way back, there were people who were seen as neither male nor female, or both at the same time. Often these people had special spiritual roles, which is also the case for the Hijras. Those are just a couple of examples I happen to know something about.
What I did not get an answer to, before being blocked, is why these facts are so aggravating to people who want to insist that there is only male sex / male gender and female sex / female gender, end of story.
If you and everyone you know are 100% male or 100% female then why would it bother you if other people see life differently? To the point of repeating over and over that such people don't exist or are mentally ill? (The rulers of the Soviet Union also labelled people they disagreed with as mentally ill...)
Sigh...
Fact # 1: Anatomically not everyone is male/XY or female/XX. Here's a rather neutral medical article about some of the many variations that exist: https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/001669.htm
Fact # 2: There isn't a simple one-on-one match between physical sex and psychological or social gender. We don't have to talk about current trends and controversies at all; this goes way back in time in many part of the world. In India,the Hijras have been recognized as a third gender for centuries. Physically, they include intersex people, castrated people, and others. In quite a number of Indigenous North American cultures, going way back, there were people who were seen as neither male nor female, or both at the same time. Often these people had special spiritual roles, which is also the case for the Hijras. Those are just a couple of examples I happen to know something about.
