QT: What happens when another culture's idea of gender does not align with your idea of gender?

submitted by FlanJam from self.GCdebatesQT

sorted by:
top
newinsightfulfun
you are viewing a single comment's thread.

view the rest of the comments →

[–]Porcelain_QuetzalTabby without Ears 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (6 children)

Other cultures do their thing. There is nothing inherently bad about that. But that culture would face the same problem that western societies face. I'm a woman. Not a third gender created for me by someone else. So if someone from that culture would label me kathoey then I'm sorry but they are wrong. And id probably tell them that. If someone else is fine with that, then great but I'm not.

Its similar with nbys. If you call a female nby a woman because that's what culture assigns based on their appearance, then you're wrong.

Gender is, and that much GC and I agree, always an issue as soon as it's assigned.

[–]SnowAssMan 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Behavioural patterns are socialisation-congruent & socialisation is sex-congruent. Sex is a catalyst, gendered socialisation is the cause & gendered behavioural patterns are the effect.

Catalyst: Infant is born who is unambiguously male

Cause: Parents, knowing the sex of their child & living in a gendered culture, treat it differently than they would a female infant, e.g. they overestimate its abilities & give it attention when it whines or grunts & play rougher with it etc.

Effect: The male sex outnumbers the female sex in media, high positions & crime, likewise trans-women outnumber trans-men & non-binary people (80% of whom are members of the female sex) in media, high positions & crime.

After we are assigned a gender, we are conditioned accordingly. Transitioning, presently, doesn't appear to be able to undo the gendered conditioning we received between the ages of 0-5.

"It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness" – Karl Marx

Basically the same thing Simone de Beauvoir was talking about when she said "one is not born, but rather becomes a woman":

"that formula (One is not born but made a woman) is the basis of all my theories & it's meaning is very simple: that being a woman is not a natural fact. It's a result of a certain history. There is no biological or psychological destiny that defines a woman as such. She is the product of a history, of civilisation, first of all, which has resulted in her current status. And secondary for each individual woman of her personal history in particular, that of her childhood. This determines her as a woman, creates in her something which is not at all innate, or an essence, something which has been called the "eternal feminine", or femininity. The more we study the psychology of children the deeper we delve, the more evident it becomes that baby girls are manufactured to become women. Long before a child is conscious, the way it is breastfed, or held, or rocked etc. inscribes in its body what might later appear a destiny." – Simone de Beauvoir

[–]adungitit 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

If you call a female nby a woman because that's what culture assigns based on their appearance, then you're wrong.

Wrong based on what?

[–]FlanJam[S] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

Its similar with nbys. If you call a female nby a woman because that's what culture assigns based on their appearance, then you're wrong.

I see what you're saying, but I feel like it can get a little tricker than that depending on the context.

If it were a one-on-one scenario, for example: a nonbinary person chatting with someone of a different culture, then I'd agree they both have to respect each other's cultural perspectives. The nonbinary person's gender should be respected in that case.

But let's say the nonbinary person is visiting another country. While they're there, everyone refers to them as a woman and with feminine gendered language. A handful of people might recognize the nonbinary person is a foreigner with a foreign concept of gender, but most will probably just call the nobinary person a woman. In that scenario, is everybody in that culture wrong for doing so?

[–]Porcelain_QuetzalTabby without Ears 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

I don't belive in objective morality. The question basically comes down to how much a culture has to respect someone who is visiting it.but honestly the rule of thump for these cases is simple.

The culture should try to ease a foreigner inside of the culture where possible, but respect their boundaries when told. Let's assume a group of Japanese ambassadors visited France during the end of Japanese isolation. While France should show them the way around, help them to fit in where possible and ask them to respect their norms the same goes the other way around. They should not ask these samurai to part with their swords during the visit for example, since these are personal symbols whose significance the French just can not understand.

[–]FlanJam[S] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Okay, I see. I think I generally agree with that. But idk how practical that would be in the nonbinary example, because nonbinary isn't a well known concept. Even in the west its not ubiquitous. So they kinda have to expect that people in another culture will refer to them as a man/woman at times. And they're not meaning to be nonbinary-phobic or anything, its just a difference in cultural perspective.

[–]Porcelain_QuetzalTabby without Ears 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Sure. I think it falls on the nby to be both lenient and open about their identity and on the other culture to be open about it. Running around people who never heard it l to understand the concept would just be frustrating