Urban v's the Commentariat

[revol68]

Called out by who? The only people who would denounce anyone who thought there could be some biological differences between the brains of those who identify as male and female are those who have dogmatically decided the answer to what is as far as I know an undetermined biological question. And just because science isn't neutral and can reproduce societal prejudices doesn't mean you can correctly decide the answer to scientific questions based on your dogma. What do you do if reality doesn't conform to how you think it should be and there is a biological mechanism at some level for gender? Do you become a raging sexist because now there is a biological justification for gender roles in society or do you ignore it no matter how convincing because it doesn't fit in with your preconceived world view?

But there is no evidence, on the contrary the studies coming back from neuroscientists are that differences between the sexes are massively exagerrated by socialisation. Even the studies that show differences show they aren't tied to sex in some simple one to one manner, rather they are a spread ike height, hence many men have "female" brains and vice versa.

I am arguing that the weaselly insistence that there is a biological mechanism causing a conflict at a pretty societal level is ideologically driven, it is based on a deep seated prejudice about sex and gender.

I likewise reject any innate explanation for the lower scores of African americans in US IQ tests, the explanation instead is tied to social economic factors and the cultural bias of IQ tests. Oddly such rejections of biological explanations doesn't provoke the same "but you can't discount the possibility of it being biological" and the reason is that thankfully racism of this sort is no longer endemic to our society in the way that sexism and gender typing is.

The money thrown at research to explain differences between men and women behaviour in biological terms is huge, the coverage given to any two bit study and the way the results are amplified or outright distorted to shore up biological essentialism is incredible, see thousands of evo psyche just so stories, from a natural history of rape to an evolutionary account of why girls prefer pink!

This is pure ideology as is weasly argument "that there might be" or it's dogmatic to discount the possibility.

 

[Combustible]

But there is no evidence, on the contrary the studies coming back from neuroscientists are that differences between the sexes are massively exagerrated by socialisation. Even the studies that show differences show they aren't tied to sex in some simple one to one manner, rather they are a spread ike height, hence many men have "female" brains and vice versa.

I am arguing that the weaselly insistence that there is a biological mechanism causing a conflict at a pretty societal level is ideologically driven, it is based on a deep seated prejudice about sex and gender.

I likewise reject any innate explanation for the lower scores of African americans in US IQ tests, the explanation instead is tied to social economic factors and the cultural bias of IQ tests. Oddly such rejections of biological explanations doesn't provoke the same "but you can't discount the possibility of it being biological" and the reason is that thankfully racism of this sort is no longer endemic to our society in the way that sexism and gender typing is.

The difference is that race is an entirely artificial while there are quite clearly biological differences between the male and female sexes. And whether or not these include differences in the brain (for most people) should not have an effect on how you view transient gender roles in society. Just because some biological differences might extend to the brain doesn't mean you have use these to explain away the differences between men and women. In fact given the massively complex nature of the brain and society, I don't think you could ever meaningful link them.

But that is not the same as insisting there can not be any differences and therefore it can not be the case that transgendered people biologically have a mismatch between their sex and gender. Do your beliefs about gender really rely on there being no differences at all? And if they do not why keeping insisting something you can not know is true?

 

[revol68]

of course my ideas on gender don't rely on there being no differences, fuck me, I'm not saying I'm a man of the world but yes I've noticed quite a few differences.

the point is that these differences don't have to map to gender, which is a series of expectations based on sexed bodies.

I'm not denying there is a mismatch between their sex and gender, it is quite obvious they do, but it is based on the fact the gender they identify with doesn't map on to their sexed body by societal expectations, this is then read as the body not fitting their identity. There can be no biological pre societal mismatch because gender is not biological even if one there is a correlation between sex and certain behaviours on a statistical level. To argue there is a biological disjoint is akin to arguing that short men have biological mismatch with their gender, or women with "male brain"(to use a shitty term) have a biological mismatch.

When people talk about social constructs they aren't denying material reality or biology, they are talking about how things are articulated, categorised and assigned significance.

 

[revol68]

and seriously this "something you can not know is true" crap is just irrational bullshit.

there are plenty of things I can't know for certain aren't true, I don't know if there isn't a dragon in the next room but if I was wanting a to explain the smell of smoke coming from it and also happened to know my housemate is a smoker or I'd left the oven on, I think I'd settle on one of them rather than speculating about about a dragon.

like I said the evidence coming back from neuroscientists is weakening the argument for the innate cognitive differences between the sexes.

more to the point though if we define someone as being in the wrong body based on the fact they have attributes commonly or statistically correlated to the other sex, then what you have is a self fufilling prophecy, men behave like this, if you behave like this you are a man. Which is exactly what is going on in Iran.

 

[revol68]

Not a fan of radical feminists take on the issue but this is mildly amusing and sums up the problem with bullshit sexed brain theory.

 

[SpineyNorman]

Can we go back to ranting about identity politics please? I understood that

 

[revol68]

Can we go back to ranting about identity politics please? I understood that

hilariously neither do the intersectionalists, they do know that transphobia is bad though and is defined as anything that might piss off some trans people.

btw quite a few trans people reject attempts to define gender dysphoria in the biological/medical manner.

 

[revol68]

We are not all defined as male or female from the moment of our birth and not everyone can be fitted into the gender binary. This isn't the first time it's been pointed out to you either: http://www.urban75.net/forums/threa...-lgbt-terminology.319196/page-3#post-12841595

In this society, generally speaking we all are, and yes intersex people have been forced into this binary, often with surgery involved without their ability to consent.

Other societies have third sexes which is interesting but there is no denying the hegemony of the binary gender model.

 

[TruXta]

In this society, generally speaking we all are, and yes intersex people have been forced into this binary, often with surgery involved without their ability to consent.

Other societies have third sexes which is interesting but there is no denying the hegemony of the binary gender model.

Well, hardly surprising giving the biological predominance of two sexes/dimorphism in humans.

 

[revol68]

Well, hardly surprising giving the biological predominance of two sexes/dimorphism in humans.

Please explain why gender should map onto the same binary as the predominant sexual one?

 

[TruXta]

Please explain why it shouldn't. It's hardly as if a predominance of two genders is something recent or particular to our current societal arrangement.

 

[revol68]

Please explain why it shouldn't. It's hardly as if a predominance of two genders is something recent or particular to our current societal arrangement.

I'm not denying its prevalence, on the contrary, what I'm asking for is an explanation as to how the overwhelming predominance of two sexes translates into two genders, especially as there have been cultures with more than two genders. What I'm saying is that gender is clearly mediated and not simply the societal shadow cast by sex.

 

[Balbi]

Camila Vallejo gets spotted by the Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/feb/09/camila-vallejo-caricatures-chile-communist

 

[ViolentPanda]

This thread seemed like the most appropriate place to leave this:
Wellesley Students Complain That a Statue of a Man in His Underwear Is “Sexual Assault”

Best comment from the studes:

So basically we're supposed to accept the interpretation of a student "revolutionary" of what the statue says?
Why would I want to do that?
Don't these eejits have something else to worry about, say like the ever-increasing toll of sexual assaults on US uni campuses?

 

[TruXta]

I'm not denying its prevalence, on the contrary, what I'm asking for is an explanation as to how the overwhelming predominance of two sexes translates into two genders, especially as there have been cultures with more than two genders. What I'm saying is that gender is clearly mediated and not simply the societal shadow cast by sex.

Saying gender is mediated is fairly trivial though. It doesn't explain anything either, it's just a description.

Saying that, I have no more than speculations to offer as to why two (and a bit) sexes has been mediated into two (and a bit) genders. I suspect the answers aren't straightforward and are down to several factors, some more social in nature, others with a more material basis. Which isn't half trivial either.

 

[ViolentPanda]

I for one find it difficult to imagine (though maybe it's the fault of my imagination) how anyone could be literally born with what you call a "medical/biological drive" to be something other than what they physically or biologically are.

Put simply, neuro-biochemistry. Just because your biology dictates that you have a particular set of genitals, does not mean you inhere all the social and biological consequences of having that set of genitals.

We are all born as we, as individuals, are. The very fact that we are all defined as either male or female from the moment of our birth is, it seems to me, the very essence of gender essentialism.

Although "gender" does not denote biological sex.
We are born with male or female (or in some cases intersex) biological sexual attributes. That doesn't make us "male" or "female", it merely means we have have certain biological sexual attributes.

The idea that everyone can be fitted into the gender binary, and that this fitting in is the most important aspect of our identities is social rather than essential or in-born.

We can trace social acceptance of a "third sex" back at least as far as the 5th century BC in ancient Greece and India, so it's not like the idea that sex and gender might extend beyond the binary is a new idea.

In the interests of helping me, and perhaps others, to understand what you mean, have you got any other examples of cases where you think people are literally born with what you call a "medical/biological drive" to be something other than what they physically or biologically are?

It's as biologically plausible for people to be born with such a drive, as it is for them not to be born with such a drive. Whether they succumb to a biological imperative is a question that can't really be answered without reference to specific cases - nurture can sometimes guide nature.

 

[ViolentPanda]

otherkin

I hate elves!!!

there are people who have strong desires to have limbs amputated etc which its been suggested might be something to do with neurology and body-mapping, but no-one knows. thats the point really, no-one knows, just like no-one knows whether people are 'born' gay or not, both sides of the argument have their political uses, but it shouldnt really be a political argument imo.

It's unavoidably a political argument until we actually understand the interplay between biological sex and gender, as well as the social and political consequences of the so-called "life-choices" involved in revealing yourself as "other than that which is normative" a lot better than we currently do.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Firstly, just because it may be to do with neurology doesn't mean it is therefore inborn. As I understand it, our neurology develops at least in part as a response to our experiences, and is therefore influenced, to an extent which is not yet fully understood, by our socialisation.

Basic structures are developed in the womb.
What you're talking about is post-natal development of neuronal pathways.
So, some might be said to be "inborn" in a very simplistic way, but yeah, some of "who and what we are" is also down to, again simplistically, socialisation.

 

[ViolentPanda]

I'm a thin good looking man, trapped in an ugly fat man's body.

I'm an ugly fat man, entirely comfortable with being in an ugly fat man's body.

 

[revol68]

Put simply, neuro-biochemistry. Just because your biology dictates that you have a particular set of genitals, does not mean you inhere all the social and biological consequences of having that set of genitals.



Although "gender" does not denote biological sex.
We are born with male or female (or in some cases intersex) biological sexual attributes. That doesn't make us "male" or "female", it merely means we have have certain biological sexual attributes.



We can trace social acceptance of a "third sex" back at least as far as the 5th century BC in ancient Greece and India, so it's not like the idea that sex and gender might extend beyond the binary is a new idea.



It's as biologically plausible for people to be born with such a drive, as it is for them not to be born with such a drive. Whether they succumb to a biological imperative is a question that can't really be answered without reference to specific cases - nurture can sometimes guide nature.

Okay but how can there be a conflict on the biological level, how would that play out? As a physical pain and does pain mean the body is conflicted, after many women get a great deal of paid from periods, are they born in the wrong body?

I mean say we accept sexed brains which is the thing that a lot of people grasp at as an innate explanation of gender dysphoria (though surely that would make it sex dysphoria), what we would have is simply that men and women can have brains that don't statistically match up with their sex, so what, why would that entail they have to match up? Such arguments are essentialists through and through. Like deciding that men whose height is more commonly female are in the wrong body and their is a biological conflict.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Me too mate. The question is, what's the appropriate response

• body modification
• psychotherapy
• a bit more exercise, a little less cake, and a bit of acceptance...

Although life is rarely as simple as your third point; your first point is meaningless (there's very little "body modification" that'll stop someone being substantively fat, for example); and your second point is a course that is unaffordable by many, and inconceivable by almost as many.

 

[revol68]

It's such fucking bullshit and if it wasn't being pushed by sections of the trans community but say bog standard white male sexists it would get short shrift, but because it is a extremely marginalised and victimised section of society there is such an unwillingness to criticise for fear of denying the validity of their experience.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Okay but how can there be a conflict on the biological level...

At a biological level, the entirety of the human body is all about biological conflict, and the struggle of certain parts of our biology to bring about equilibrium, whether we're talking at a cellular level or an endocrinological level. Our biology is never really "at peace" with itself.

...how would that play out? As a physical pain and does pain mean the body is conflicted, after many women get a great deal of paid from periods, are they born in the wrong body?

That's a very poor analogy. Periods can cause pain because of the physical purgative action necessary.
And sure, biological conflict can obviously manifest as physical pain - as a "cancer" tumour, or as stress to a particular part of our complex governing systems.
Equally obviously, biological conflict can manifest as psychic distress - we can be "depressed" without an attributable physical or emotional cause.

I mean say we accept sexed brains which is the thing that a lot of people grasp at as an innate explanation of gender dysphoria (though surely that would make it sex dysphoria), what we would have is simply that men and women can have brains that don't statistically match up with their sex, so what, why would that entail they have to match up? Such arguments are essentialists through and through. Like deciding that men whose height is more commonly female are in the wrong body and their is a biological conflict.

The "sexed brain" argument doesn't really hold water as far as I'm concerned - the few slight structural differences don't seem to "map" to the claims made for them, IYSWIM.

IMO we can have a basic biological (neurochemical) conflict between our physical sex and "what we feel ourselves to be". However, a lot of how our life-story plays out is dependent on how we socially and emotionally develop as individuals, and how that combines with any biological conflict. We can't say "X plus Y equals Z" because human development has a far more complex set of variables that X, Y and Z.

 

[andysays]

Put simply, neuro-biochemistry. Just because your biology dictates that you have a particular set of genitals, does not mean you inhere all the social and biological consequences of having that set of genitals.

As I understand it, neuro-biology is dependent, to some as-yet-unknown extent, on socialisation in the broad sense. We're not born as "blank slates", but that doesn't mean the slate doesn't get written on after we're born (agree totally with your second sentence there, so won't attempt to add anything to it).

Although "gender" does not denote biological sex.
We are born with male or female (or in some cases intersex) biological sexual attributes. That doesn't make us "male" or "female", it merely means we have have certain biological sexual attributes.

Even the concepts of "male" and "female" are human constructs rather than objective catagories. We are each born with individual attributes, which are then developed by socialisation, including/particularly the dominant gender binary idea that we all must be either male or female, and that that distinction is the most important part of our identity.

We can trace social acceptance of a "third sex" back at least as far as the 5th century BC in ancient Greece and India, so it's not like the idea that sex and gender might extend beyond the binary is a new idea.

No, it's not a new idea, but it is now dominant and has, as far as I can see, been dominant at most times in most cultures. The fact that I recognise it as dominant doesn't mean I also regard it as correct or positive,

It's as biologically plausible for people to be born with such a drive, as it is for them not to be born with such a drive. Whether they succumb to a biological imperative is a question that can't really be answered without reference to specific cases - nurture can sometimes guide nature.

Most biological drives, as far as I am aware, serve the evolutionary purposes of prolonging the life of the individual and ensuring the continuity of the species (biological drives are, of course, not confined to the human species). I asked someone who brought this up to provide me with a concrete example rather than a vague notion of an urge to overcome what one is, because it sounds proper confused to me, but since you aren't the one who brought it up, I won't expect you to justify it.

And when we're talking specifically about people, I would argue that nurture/socialisation always guides nature. It's like the famous experiment where a baby was brought up without being exposed to language to see what was the "natural" language it would speak. We know how that one ended, right?

 

[el-ahrairah]

this isn't especially new, but i have just discovered it. here is eve ensler, writer of the vagina monologues....

"
There are no accidents. Or may be everything is an accident. My friend Paul says to me, “It’s like you’ve got Congo Stigmata.” Well, actually, almost everyone said it in one way or another. “It doesn’t surprise me, Eve, of course. All those stories of rape over all these years. The women have entered you.” And at first I pushed this away because it’s not really a great advertising for activism. Come care about others, listen to their stories and their pain, and you can contact it too. Then immediately after the surgery, the doctors told me that they had discovered inside me that they had rarely seen before. Cells of endometrial (uterine) cancer had created a tumor between the vagina and bowel and had “fistulated” the rectum. Essentially, the cancer had done exactly what rape had done to so many thousands of women in the Congo. I ended up having the same surgery as many of them."

http://talkmag.in/cms/columns/book-talk/item/1564-the-congo-stigmata

 

[rekil]

So should PD demand mandatory hermaphroditism for all or not.

 

[revol68]

At a biological level, the entirety of the human body is all about biological conflict, and the struggle of certain parts of our biology to bring about equilibrium, whether we're talking at a cellular level or an endocrinological level. Our biology is never really "at peace" with itself.



That's a very poor analogy. Periods can cause pain because of the physical purgative action necessary.
And sure, biological conflict can obviously manifest as physical pain - as a "cancer" tumour, or as stress to a particular part of our complex governing systems.
Equally obviously, biological conflict can manifest as psychic distress - we can be "depressed" without an attributable physical or emotional cause.



The "sexed brain" argument doesn't really hold water as far as I'm concerned - the few slight structural differences don't seem to "map" to the claims made for them, IYSWIM.

IMO we can have a basic biological (neurochemical) conflict between our physical sex and "what we feel ourselves to be". However, a lot of how our life-story plays out is dependent on how we socially and emotionally develop as individuals, and how that combines with any biological conflict. We can't say "X plus Y equals Z" because human development has a far more complex set of variables that X, Y and Z.

Yeah the what we see ourselves to be bit is where gender dysphoria stems from, the disjoint people feel, the sense that their body is alien, it is a social issue, but that doesn't make it any less real for them. Like I said there is a common tendency to see matters as totally determined or a free choice. Many people who suffer depression feel that attempts to explain it as a social problem rather than as a simple medical one is to deny the reality of depression and make it something you can "snap out of" or whatever. Considering the abuse trans people get it is hardly surprising that many seek the solidity of the biological model for legitimisation, after all it bestows a "realness" denied to social constructs. When you add in the fact medical insurers won't pay for treatments etc that arent strictly medical the appeal of such explanations is totally understandable.

 

[TruXta]

the solidity of the biological model for legitimisation, after all it bestows a "realness" denied to social constructs.

Note that the scales of realness can be reversed too - see the attempts of religious folks to fend off neuro-biologically based explanations for religious thought and behaviour. Social constructs (fucking hate that term btw) can be socially defended as real as much as material bases.

 

[revol68]

Note that the scales of realness can be reversed too - see the attempts of religious folks to fend off neuro-biologically based explanations for religious thought and behaviour. Social constructs (fucking hate that term btw) can be socially defended as real as much as material bases.

I detest those bullshit explanations of religions though. Oh we found the god molecule, fuck up, religion is a social matter, at best you are onto showing there is a neurological basis for transcendental ideas, hardly ground breaking, would be more shocking if there was wasn't one.

 

[smokedout]

Considering the abuse trans people get it is hardly surprising that many seek the solidity of the biological model for legitimisation, after all it bestows a " social constructs. When you add in the fact medical insurers won't pay for treatments etc that arent strictly medical the appeal of such explanations is totally understandable.

Had it ever occurred to you that trans people might be telling the truth about how they experience their bodies and its not all a secret ruse to get free sex changes or politically legitimise transsexualism?