QT/trans: What would be the worst things to happen if the concept of gender did not exist?

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[–]adungitit 16 insightful - 1 fun16 insightful - 0 fun17 insightful - 1 fun -  (34 children)

Sex trait combinations actually occur along a spectrum

Almost all human beings, barring <1% of medical disorders, are male or female. This is a spectrum as much as a number of human limbs is a spectrum.

Men and women show natural variance in their male and female bodies - this doesn't make them the opposite sex. Sex isn't defined by secondary characteristics, hence why various developmental issues can affect the sexes while still making their sex apparent.

With no artificial sex binary

The reality of male and female bodies is not artificial. You can see that in a simple fact of mammalian reproduction.

With no artificial sex binary and the oppressive societies that they breed

This comes back to the pretty damn offensive idea that the problem with the patriarchy is simply down to those pesky females having to be female, and if they didn't, superior males wouldn't naturally abuse and subjugate them. Instead of fixing oppression, the victims are blamed for being different and facilitating said oppression through that because of the natural order.

people who are born with or desire different sex trait combinations won’t be stigmatized.

You are assuming that coveting opposite sex traits to the point of suicidal ideation and spending a lifetime on drugs in order to prevent your body from naturally producing the hormones that it's supposed to have, and amputating perfectly normal body parts just because you've convinced yourself your properly developed body parts are "wrong" or "defective" is in any way good for the person. Moreover, the patriarchal ideas internalised in these body parts are an almost unavoidable part of the motivation for removing or deforming them, and trans people aren't shy about stating it. There is a reason people obsess the most over removing the things that are loaded with social meaning, as opposed to, I dunno, one third of their toes.

[–]HeimdeklediROAR 2 insightful - 10 fun2 insightful - 9 fun3 insightful - 10 fun -  (33 children)

No, no humans are male or female because its a spectrum. Also the number of limbs on a human being is objectively not a fixed number, so yeah you could describe it as a spectrum.

All sex traits determine an individuals sex spectrum status, not just “primary” ones. The distinction is arbitrary.

Mammalian reproduction following a two gamete pattern does not show that their are only two sexes, because some people who don’t produce gametes. Since those people aren’t sexless, sex is based on anatomy and therefore a spectrum as sexual anatomy occurs in intermediate forms across a whole range of possible sex trait configurations.

It in no way supports such an idea? The issue is oppressive systems of thinking not people posessing certain sex trait configurations

Cis people and their noxious sytsems of oppression are what fuel the tendency for trans people to normalize their appearances in line with cis standards of appearance. I’m sorry, what was that you said about victim blaming? 🙄

[–]adungitit 15 insightful - 2 fun15 insightful - 1 fun16 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

no humans are male or female because its a spectrum.

How exactly do you think babies are made?

the number of limbs on a human being is objectively not a fixed number, so yeah you could describe it as a spectrum.

It is fixed, and the fact that developmental disorders exist doesn't change that.

All sex traits determine an individuals sex spectrum status, not just “primary” ones.

If you redefine sex to include things that it's not supposed to include, sure. But sex IS about primary characteristics, hence why doctors can still easily tell who's male or female regardless of secondary characteristics. They're not scratching their heads unless it's primary characteristics.

some people don’t produce gametes. Since those people aren’t sexless

They still develop the anatomy specifically for producing only one type of gamete. Infertility doesn't change the fact that the sexes develop in a consistent way to facilitate this. You can have malfunctioning equipment, but that doesn't mean the equipment isn't there, or worse yet, the fact that it's malfunctioning doesn't mean it cannot be defined according to its structure, development and purpose, or even worse yet, the fact that it's malfunctioning doesn't mean it can be defined as anything your heart desires. If you remove tires from a car or if a car stops working or hell, if a car is in a garage and isn't being used, that's still a car. It hasn't turned into a bird or a plane just because it doesn't serve its function.

The distinction is arbitrary.

Human reproduction certainly disagrees. No-one was prevented from getting pregnant just by believing in their pronouns hard enough, so the real arbiter has pretty consistently decided on this.

Do you think reproductive capabilities are a completely random throw of the dice? Why do you think mammalian sexes have developed in the first place? Why do you think there has never in the entire history of humanity been a single pregnant male or an impregnating female? Like literally never?

It in no way supports such an idea? The issue is oppressive systems of thinking not people posessing certain sex trait configurations

You've said that oppressive societies are bred by the sex binary. Were you specifically referring to societies oppressive to trans people, though? Because it sounds like you're not even considering patriarchal oppression in this arrangement.

Cis people and their noxious sytsems of oppression are what fuel the tendency for trans people to normalize their appearances in line with cis standards of appearance.

Are you saying that the only reason trans people transition is because of "cis oppression"? I don't think that's a sentiment most trans people would get behind.

Moreover, trans people objectively have no issues with their sex at all, like literally none. The only reason they think they have is because of a mental illness. At the end of the day, it's people who are convinced they should be something they're not, to the point of wanting unnecessary and damaging intervention on their bodies. It is something rooted in hatred of one's normal body, and that is in stark contrast with other oppressed groups. Trans people have more in common with body integrity disorder than intersex people.

[–]VioletRemihomosexual female (aka - lesbian) 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

They still develop the anatomy specifically for producing only one type of gamete.

A little fix: "specifically to support only one type of gamete."

Full sex definition is something like "Female is a living organism that is grown with aim to support and/or produce large immovable gametes". it covers all species, except some mushrooms, bacteria and organizms which are cloning themselves (and even ones which are cloning can have sex, thought).

[–]VioletRemihomosexual female (aka - lesbian) 12 insightful - 1 fun12 insightful - 0 fun13 insightful - 1 fun -  (30 children)

some people who don’t produce gametes

Do you know that women are not producing gametes?

We are born with all gametes we will ever mature and release.

Do you know that pre-puberty no one is producing or maturing gametes? And that all women after menopause and all men after andropause are not producing or maturing gametes?

Do you know that during pregnancy women are not maturing any gametes?

Do you know that menstruation is body removing matured egg which was not fertilized with extra layer of endometrium which grown to become placenta? And only after that new egg from ovaries will start maturing and later be released.

If "producing gametes" was the definition of sex, then only men post puberty and pre andropause would be sexed, all other humans would be sexless!

[–]MarkTwainiac 10 insightful - 1 fun10 insightful - 0 fun11 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

If "producing gametes" was the definition of sex, then only men post puberty and pre andropause would be sexed, all other humans would be sexless!

Yes. And even if we expanded the definition to "producing or releasing gametes," it would still mean most girls & women would be sexless 99% of the time during our prime reproductive years. Coz even during the approximately 40 years between menarche and menopause when female humans are capable of maturing and releasing eggs, we aren't capable of doing this all the time - or even most of the time. When not pregnant, on hormonal BC or breastfeeding, girls and women typically release an egg once every 28 days, for a total of 13 a year. Only males can produce sperm at will 24/7/365 and by the hundreds of millions each time.

Heimdekledi has a very male view of human sex. Either due to being utterly clueless about how female bodies work, or from choosing to ignore human female biology altogether coz its realities contradict the spurious claims that "no humans are male or female" and that "sexual anatomy occurs in intermediate forms across a whole range."

[–]HeimdeklediROAR 1 insightful - 7 fun1 insightful - 6 fun2 insightful - 7 fun -  (28 children)

It was intended to cover people whom could produce any sort of viable gamete at any point in their lives. This would be a gamete basis of sex after all.

[–]VioletRemihomosexual female (aka - lesbian) 10 insightful - 1 fun10 insightful - 0 fun11 insightful - 1 fun -  (27 children)

No, it would not. It is pretty male-centric position and complete lack of understanding of females and our experiences, and our biology.

Supporting gamete type is not same as producing gametes.

That was more of a educational post anyways, so you can have some idea about us and our biology.

[–]HeimdeklediROAR 2 insightful - 7 fun2 insightful - 6 fun3 insightful - 7 fun -  (26 children)

A gamete must be formed in order for determination of sex based on gamete type to be used.

[–]adungitit 10 insightful - 1 fun10 insightful - 0 fun11 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

It doesn't. The reason you (and other mammals) have the sex that you have is because your body was developed to facilitate production of one of only two gamete types, much like how a gun was made to shoot bullets and it doesn't stop being a gun the moment you stop shooting it, or if it's empty, or if it malfunctions. Your logic would be like defining a gun as "only the weapon that is currently in the process of successfully shooting bullets" and then claiming that guns aren't real.

The fact that gametes aren't produced 24/7 does not make the sexes stop existing, because the sexes never were defined according to this ability. Science has accounted for this, which is why male and female children or infertile or dead people are still male or female even if they aren't producing gametes: they have their anatomy in the first place because mammalian biology first needs a body specifically developed to produce one type of gamete before we can even talk about a gamete actually being produced. This is why humans have been able to successfully reproduce with each other for millions of years: You don't need to see someone's DNA or chromosomes to know whether they are human and whether they are male or female, that much is obvious just from looking at their body.

[–]MarkTwainiac 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Biologists came up the idea of defining of sex based on whether one's anatomy is meant to support either male or female gametes because it applies to all sexually-reproducing plants and animals. It's the simplest criterion for sex, one that can be applied across the board to all the diverse species that reproduce sexually, and allows for the fact that there is great variation in the exact ways sexually reproducing plant and animal species reproduce.

But that doesn't mean gametes or potential (future or past) for gametes constitutes the only fundamental criteria for defining sex in all species. In humans, the primary sex characteristics include more than the organs where gametes come from (the ovaries and testes).

This is especially true for female humans, because we conceive, carry and grow gestating offspring inside our bodies, birth them when they are already well advanced in development, then (can) breastfeed them. As opposed to, say, female birds that lay their eggs after they've been fertilized internally so their offspring do much of their development outside their mothers' bodies. Or as opposed to female fish who lay their eggs unfertilized, then the males fertilize them afterwards. And as is different to female marsupials, who conceive & gestate their offspring inside organs within their abdominal cavities, and give birth to them when they are very young and still hardly developed, then keep & suckle them in pouches on their bellies for the rest of their development.

[–]MarkTwainiac 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

A gamete must be formed in order for determination of sex based on gamete type to be used.

But how exactly does gamete formation occur? You seem to have no idea about what happens during the various stages of oogenesis and how oogenesis differs from spermatogenesis.

https://study.com/academy/lesson/oogenesis-how-the-female-reproductive-system-produces-eggs.html

https://youtu.be/hKa57JPfKDE

[–]HeimdeklediROAR 1 insightful - 6 fun1 insightful - 5 fun2 insightful - 6 fun -  (1 child)

I mean its been a while since freshman bio so I don’t remember the specifics of either, but the differences are immaterial in this discussion. The point was that if you’re going to determine sex by the gametes an individual has at any time had, then those individuals must actually have had gametes at some point, or else they’d be classified as sexless.

[–]MarkTwainiac 6 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 0 fun7 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

if you’re going to determine sex by the gametes an individual has at any time had, then those individuals must actually have had gametes at some point, or else they’d be classified as sexless.

But you're deliberately misrepresenting the definition. Sex isn't determined by "the gametes an individual has at any time," it's based on having physically developed early in life along the pathway meant to result in individuals having the potential capacity to produce or release one of the other of the two gamete types - ova or sperm - at a later point in life. In the case of humans, this potential capacity is alway time-limited to the phase in life that starts with/comes after puberty. For human females, the potential capacity is further limited to the approximately 40 years between menarche and menopause, and to the specific moment in every 28-day (on average) cycle when ovulation occurs.

In humans, whether an individual has the gonads meant to and capable producing one or the other type of gamete is not the sole determinant of sex. Sex in humans is determined by other primary sex characteristics, such as chromosomes and the presence or absence of other organs.

You know all this, of course. Just spelling it out for others.

[–]VioletRemihomosexual female (aka - lesbian) 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (20 children)

It is formed once by our mothers, when they are pregnant with us. So only women pregnant with girls are producing ovums. And only once during that pregnancy.

[–]adungitit 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

You are explaining that their understanding of gametes is faulty and they're interpreting everything you say as "Since gametes don't work that way, it means that gametes and their relation to sex cannot be understood".

[–]VioletRemihomosexual female (aka - lesbian) 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Their side just have very male-centric understanding of gametes, from a perspective of a male body. While for women/females what I am speaking is pretty clear and understandable and obvious. We are taking this for granted, forgetting that culture is very male-centric and mostly promoting male sexual reproduction, while shaming female's natural cycles and trying to hide them. So we should not forget that males (and sometimes even females) have no idea about our realities and trying to judge us based on how they would judge themselves or other males. That's why so much misunderstoonding, they are ignoring fact that our body works differently to theirs, and that we have different experience because of that.

[–]HeimdeklediROAR 2 insightful - 6 fun2 insightful - 5 fun3 insightful - 6 fun -  (17 children)

Yes?

[–]VioletRemihomosexual female (aka - lesbian) 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (16 children)

Yes.

[–]HeimdeklediROAR 1 insightful - 6 fun1 insightful - 5 fun2 insightful - 6 fun -  (15 children)

So again they must be produced.