Do you not believe in biological sex? Iâm confused.
Hoo, boy. Apologies in advance, but this is gonna have a long answer.
The thing about âbiological sexâ is, itâs a complicated science with a lot of nuance involved, and people who donât actually know anything about it love to use it to mean âpenis is boy, vagina is girlâ.
Which, on the surface, makes sense to a lot of people. Its what weâre taught our whole lives, and itâs difficult to listen to any argument that contradicts our worldview. Itâs scary and confusing, and people automatically resist scary and confusing things.
The thing you need to know, though, is that what we call âBiological Sexâ can actually depend on a range of factors:Â
First off, primary sex characteristics: the bits directly involved in reproduction, what most people consider the defining indicator of gender.
Primary sex characteristics include the penis and testes, which are predominantly associated with men, and the vagina and uterus, associated with women.
This seems fairly simple on the surface, scientifically speaking, but bodies arenât that simple. People can and are born with combinations of these things and live long, happy, healthy lives with few or no medical complaints. Many donât even know they have undescended testes or ovaries at all, and only find out accidentally through unrelated procedures. Is a mother of three whoâs known herself to be a woman her whole life suddenly a man because she has âmaleâ sex characteristics? No? Then why should any other woman?
Someone who is still new to this might be experiencing a cognitive dissonance right now, trying to reconcile âpenis is boy, vagina is girlâ with âpeople can have both (or neither)â, and they may try to do this by saying, âWell, this could be caused by mutations or deformities, so intersex people (people with mixed characteristics) are outliers, not to be included with âvalidâ genders.â
Which brings us to the next factor: hormones.
Testosterone is Boy, Estrogen is Girl. Thatâs what people know, so they donât want to accept any different. Different is confusing, confusing is scary, scary is bad.
But, like primary sex characteristics, these things can fly in the face of common understanding.
A woman, for example, who considers herself cisgender, who has breasts and a vagina and a uterus and all that, might have high testosterone. Because people have both! And because testosterone can give people body hair, among other things, this woman has chest hair and a beard. She LOOKS a lot like what we think of as âmaleâ, so do we tell her sheâs wrong about her gender?Â
On the flip side, plenty of cis men with a penis and testes can have high estrogen for any number of reasons, and can develop breasts- does that mean theyâre women, now?Â
Of course not. We have to listen to them to tell us what their pronouns are, what their gender is, and how is that any different from someone whoâs trans? It would be incredibly ride to tell anyone that âoh, you SAY youâre a man, but you look like a woman to me, so Iâm going to ignore everything you tell me and call you a woman until you can prove to my satisfaction otherwise.â
So if primary sex characteristics arenât the final word on gender, and secondary characteristics arenât either, then whatâs left? DNA, right? Genetics donât lie, everyone knows that.
So, chromosomes, then. The barest evidence of human biological sex. XX means âfemaleâ, XY means âmaleâ, forget all that mess about vaginas, breasts, and testes. Our chromosomes are the holy gospel of gender.
Except, again, nature isnât that simple.
Picture in your head a cisgender woman. She hits everything on our personal little checklist: breasts, vagina, uterus, minimal body hair, small jawline, high voice, everything. But she has XY chromosomes.Â
Because, surprise! That happens! And it happens more often than you think! People can and do go their entire lives not knowing it! Because it isnât important to how we view our gender. We donât care.Â
If you went to a lab today, got tested, and found that you had the âwrongâ chromosomes- would you suddenly be fine with Becoming A Different Gender? Being treated like youâre a different gender? Having to dress different, talk different, redefine your sexuality, because your DNA says youâre wrong about your identity? How would that feel? Probably pretty shitty, huh?Â
So, when we get down to it, what is the one true indicator of gender? We canât trust genitalia, because it presents on any number of variations and combinations. Secondary sex characteristics are out too, because hormones do whatever they want without rhyme or reason. Chromosomes do whatever the hell they want, fuck them, theyâre useless.
If we are to open our minds to what the science is telling us, then, what is it saying?
If we are to put our faith in âBiological Sexâ, then what does is dictate to be the truth?
That physical sex isnât just âboy or girlâ, it exists on a spectrum. Itâs not âpink or blueâ, itâs magenta, mauve, violet, lilac, periwinkle, cyan, cobalt, or vermilion, and our idea of âboy or girlâ is almost entirely a construct of our imaginations, of the society we live in. Itâs an illusion that dictates how we experience our lives, how weâre treated, what makes us happy and comfortable or how we feel at ease.
Biological sex cannot dictate gender because theyâre different concepts with different rules grounded in separate realities, and no amount of pointless fussing can force them to cooperate.Â
Sex is one spectrum, gender is another, and they donât know each other.
You can accept what the science says, or you can find excuses to justify the beliefs youâre comfortable with. It really doesnât matter.Â
Just donât be a dick about things that make you uncomfortable and the world will keep on spinning.
discoholicmusic
dailybridgerton
prguitarman
origamiaround
blakekathryn
izzy806
titsay
