Sunday, July 9, 2017
Posted in
Life
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Politics
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This article was triggered by the efforts of transgender people to redefine the sexual terms that we use.
Gender
The transgender movement has been trying to redefine the term "gender" to mean "sexual identity". Thus, if you are a girl who feels like a boy, your gender is "male" even if you have the body of a girl. "Sex" is now being given as the term that describes the body's gender. This is a clever rationalization that allows a girl to call herself a boy, or a man to call himself a woman, etc. It is, in my view, part of the nonsense that the transgender movement is trying to foist on us -- "I am a boy because that's how I feel" (etc., etc.). The word "gender" has always referred to physical characteristics.
I have sympathy for people who feel that they were born the wrong gender, but to claim that you belong to the opposite gender despite physical evidence to the contrary is just a conceit, especially if you have not had a sex-change operation. Biology is destiny.
Assigned at Birth
Let's stop using the phrase "gender assigned at birth". No one assigns anyone their gender, not even the doctor who delivers the baby. After birth, the doctor simply notes the gender of the baby by looking at its genitals. Making such a note is not an "assignment" of gender. As I say above, gender is a physical thing, not a mental thing.
Cisgender, Cis
The term "cisgender" was recently coined to mean a person whose gender identity corresponds with his or her body. Thus, a person with a male body who identifies as a male is a "cisgender" person. On the other hand, a person with a male body who identifies as a female is a "transgender" person. Sometimes, "cisgender" is abbreviated to "cis", as in "cis male" and "cis female".
As I've already said, gender is found in the body, not in the brain, so putting "cis" before "gender" isn't necessary. These are terms being pushed into the language by the 1% of people who are transgender (i.e., people who identify with the opposite sex). To me, a person with a male body is a male regardless of how he feels. If such a person identifies with females, I have no problem calling him "transgender" or a "transgender woman". A man with a male body who identifies with his physical gender is just a "male", not a "cis" male.
However, the "cis" terms do have their utility in the sense that they are shortcuts when reading about the transgender topic and can quickly clarify an author's meaning. Even s
There's a certain tyrrany here (although the word "tyrrany" may be too strong). This very small percentage of the population is trying to redefine our sexual terms while they appropriate the sexual terms of the larger population. Thus, I become a "cis male" while the "transgender male" is just a "male". I don't understand why it isn't enough for a transgender "male" to say "I am a female who identifies with males". For such a person to call himself a "boy" or "man" comes across as deluded or pretentious. As I say in my other article on the transgender movement, a trans person doesn't get to tell me what gender he or she is; I make that decision for myself.
Personally, I would be happy with the terms "physical gender" and "mental gender". A transgender "woman" who says "I am physically male but mentally female" is getting closer to the truth than saying, "I am a woman". I am not going to dispute his contention that he feels like a woman, and to be polite, I would call him "she" and "her". But when she starts to tell me how much she resents that traditional feminists won't accept her into their society, she'll have to my opinion that she isn't actually a woman. Ultimately, I make up my own mind about people.
Binary
Binary is a term that transgender people have applied to people (like me) who believe in, and embody, only two genders. I see the word as a sneer, as if we were somehow limited in our thinking. No transgender person would admit it, but in using the word "binary" to describe ordinary people, they are trying to feel superior.
Queer
I am gay. The term "gay" was given to homosexuals by heterosexuals who perceived the lives of single homosexuals to be free of responsibility and therefore "gay". "Gay" means "happy", and for that reason I don't object to it. However, I DO object to being called "queer". "Queer" was, and still is, a disparaging term for gays. It means "strange" or "odd" or "perverted", things which I am not. Younger gays have appropriated the term, but I find it to be objectionable.
Q for "queer" has now been added to the initialism "LGBT", resulting in "LGBTQ": Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer. Some people have tried to soften that by saying that the Q means "Questioning", but it doesn't. Since homosexuality is represented by the L, the G and the B, there is no need to add Q to the initialism. ("Initialism", not "abbreviation", is the right term to use in this case.)
Gender
The transgender movement has been trying to redefine the term "gender" to mean "sexual identity". Thus, if you are a girl who feels like a boy, your gender is "male" even if you have the body of a girl. "Sex" is now being given as the term that describes the body's gender. This is a clever rationalization that allows a girl to call herself a boy, or a man to call himself a woman, etc. It is, in my view, part of the nonsense that the transgender movement is trying to foist on us -- "I am a boy because that's how I feel" (etc., etc.). The word "gender" has always referred to physical characteristics.
I have sympathy for people who feel that they were born the wrong gender, but to claim that you belong to the opposite gender despite physical evidence to the contrary is just a conceit, especially if you have not had a sex-change operation. Biology is destiny.
Assigned at Birth
Let's stop using the phrase "gender assigned at birth". No one assigns anyone their gender, not even the doctor who delivers the baby. After birth, the doctor simply notes the gender of the baby by looking at its genitals. Making such a note is not an "assignment" of gender. As I say above, gender is a physical thing, not a mental thing.
Cisgender, Cis
The term "cisgender" was recently coined to mean a person whose gender identity corresponds with his or her body. Thus, a person with a male body who identifies as a male is a "cisgender" person. On the other hand, a person with a male body who identifies as a female is a "transgender" person. Sometimes, "cisgender" is abbreviated to "cis", as in "cis male" and "cis female".
As I've already said, gender is found in the body, not in the brain, so putting "cis" before "gender" isn't necessary. These are terms being pushed into the language by the 1% of people who are transgender (i.e., people who identify with the opposite sex). To me, a person with a male body is a male regardless of how he feels. If such a person identifies with females, I have no problem calling him "transgender" or a "transgender woman". A man with a male body who identifies with his physical gender is just a "male", not a "cis" male.
However, the "cis" terms do have their utility in the sense that they are shortcuts when reading about the transgender topic and can quickly clarify an author's meaning. Even s
There's a certain tyrrany here (although the word "tyrrany" may be too strong). This very small percentage of the population is trying to redefine our sexual terms while they appropriate the sexual terms of the larger population. Thus, I become a "cis male" while the "transgender male" is just a "male". I don't understand why it isn't enough for a transgender "male" to say "I am a female who identifies with males". For such a person to call himself a "boy" or "man" comes across as deluded or pretentious. As I say in my other article on the transgender movement, a trans person doesn't get to tell me what gender he or she is; I make that decision for myself.
Personally, I would be happy with the terms "physical gender" and "mental gender". A transgender "woman" who says "I am physically male but mentally female" is getting closer to the truth than saying, "I am a woman". I am not going to dispute his contention that he feels like a woman, and to be polite, I would call him "she" and "her". But when she starts to tell me how much she resents that traditional feminists won't accept her into their society, she'll have to my opinion that she isn't actually a woman. Ultimately, I make up my own mind about people.
Binary
Binary is a term that transgender people have applied to people (like me) who believe in, and embody, only two genders. I see the word as a sneer, as if we were somehow limited in our thinking. No transgender person would admit it, but in using the word "binary" to describe ordinary people, they are trying to feel superior.
Queer
I am gay. The term "gay" was given to homosexuals by heterosexuals who perceived the lives of single homosexuals to be free of responsibility and therefore "gay". "Gay" means "happy", and for that reason I don't object to it. However, I DO object to being called "queer". "Queer" was, and still is, a disparaging term for gays. It means "strange" or "odd" or "perverted", things which I am not. Younger gays have appropriated the term, but I find it to be objectionable.
Q for "queer" has now been added to the initialism "LGBT", resulting in "LGBTQ": Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer. Some people have tried to soften that by saying that the Q means "Questioning", but it doesn't. Since homosexuality is represented by the L, the G and the B, there is no need to add Q to the initialism. ("Initialism", not "abbreviation", is the right term to use in this case.)
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