Quote:
Originally Posted by Rathji
You can't mentally reclassify yourself to change your physical body. In the context of what I was responding to, about referring to a person as male when they physical present as female, then I would of course use the female descriptor. If that was confusing to you, then I apologize, but I did not think a greater amount of detail was necessary in that post.
Let me rephrase it now, so you that you can understand what I meant.
If someone is presenting themselves as a biological female, and society were to accept them as having the normal traits, appearance and demeanor of a typical female, and someone were to refer to that person as a male then they would have violated the social norms appropriate to that situation.
|
I should apologize as apparently I have not made my position clear. I know I was wrong to say "he" as all of the medical procedures and legal work was done in this case. She is legally considered a 'she' and that is how I should have stated it.
The past few posts, however, were not concerned with pronouns but why the sex/gender issue is set apart from other issues. The 'curing' a gay/lesbian argument is a totally irrelevant as attraction and sexuality have no physical or biological characteristics. The gender classifiers are also not important as I am sure the whole spectrum of masculine/feminine exists within the sexes of gays and lesbians (as it does within the hetero community).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rathji
It is different.
Gender is a social construct, and as such is a product of our minds. If your mind thinks it is feminine gender, then it is. It's not as simple as an anorexic thinking they are fat, because fat is a physical state. Just thinking you are fat does not make you fat, but thinking that your gender is feminine does make you feminine.
|
This still does not explain the jump to make the feminine a female and why it is ok only in a few very carefully controlled cases. The only things I can come up with is due to the political/lobbying clout of the LGBT community and from the medical side, simply because they can.
I believe that the medical side would love to take a crack at a number of issues but they do not have the support or backing of group strong enough to sway the politics of doing so.