Nature and Gender is a social construct

[silverspirit]

Nature vs Nurture, the title rejected by the website

It seems to me, this debate has not been settled. It is particularly relevant when discussing trans rights and feminism.

To me, when saying gender is a social construct, it is a nurture argument, and misses out on the nature aspect. Being gay is a nature argument, as evidenced by homosexuality being found in nature. Nurture wont change you sexuality.

Richard Dawkins has come down as a naturist. Personally, I think the situation is more complex. It is upbringing plus nature.

I think upbringing is very powerful. The golden rule is taught. You only need to see the upbringing of radical Muslims to see the truth of that, engaging in child marriage, rape and slavery happening in ISIS lands. (not that the golden rule cannot logically derived, and human empathy can derive it also).

It is not to say Transsexuality does not exist, it has a nature component to it. But the nurture component does exit in the real world, telling young impressionable kids it is ok to be trans. All well and good, but feminism goes on to say, you nature is subservient to your nurture. That gender is a social construct. And that is dangerous.

To understand why, we must examine the prevalence of adhd. In olden times we called sufferers naughty. We had a mechanism to deal with it. Spare the rod, spoil the child. Pain is a very good lesson in teaching behaviour’s, as barbaric as it is. The emotional blackmail employed by modern parenting does not do the job as effectively. To me, both approaches are needed.

Back to gender is a social construct. Saying this confuses children, at a time were they are impressionable. And confusion, leads to some children going against their nature, and embracing transexuality. It comes with the sunken cost fallacy, which means they are likely to go for surgeries and hormone suppression therapies, all the while being encouraged by the medical community who are beholden to feminist theories.

It is nature plus nurture which makes the human. To deny this is to deny nature itself.

[fireflies]

@silverspirit

To me, when saying gender is a social construct, it is a nurture argument, and misses out on the nature aspect. Being gay is a nature argument, as evidenced by homosexuality being found in nature. Nurture wont change you sexuality.

I would say this is an over-simplification in terms of evidence in nature. There are a number of factors involved that can distinguish examples in nature, and while there are instances of same-sex preference when opposite-sex partners are available, it is a smaller part of a wider scope of social and environmental factors. Though I am not disagreeing that for humans, sexual preference is rooted in nature (though I don’t think the “nurture” aspect can be ruled out as having an influence either - nature shows us that social factors are at play in the non-human animal kingdom, so the reference works for both sides here.

@silverspirit

but feminism goes on to say, you nature is subservient to your nurture

Why restrict this view to feminism?

It is a typical view that we are not “animals” (in the biological classification sense, of course we are) - we don’t resort to base desires and instincts - we have laws, civilisation, etc. Our nuture overrides much of our nature. Where there is a conflict between nature and nurture, we are expected to keep our nature in check to remain civilised.

@silverspirit

all the while being encouraged by the medical community who are beholden to feminist theories.

Not sure why you’re conflating feminism with trans matters?

@silverspirit

It is nature plus nurture which makes the human. To deny this is to deny nature itself.

Some elements of nature are to be denied. It’s not an all or nothing choice.

Some arguments are that the issue is a conflict within nature. We can see this directly with biological conflicts - the fact that biological sex cannot be objectively defined because there are overlaps in every possible means of classification. The trans position is often that a person’s sense of self (their nature) is at odds with another aspect of their nature (physical biological traits).

Developments in neurodivergence highlight how people can think differently, and this is a spectrum of difference - it can manifest in so many different ways. Who can say what a person feels, and whether those feelings are valid or not?

You seem to be conflating a lot of arguments together and it doesn’t help the points you are trying to make.

@silverspirit

That gender is a social construct.

Gender - in the contemporary understanding at least, is distinct from biological sex. The two terms have their own meanings, with biological sex being based on one’s physical attributes, and gender being based on self-identity. Gender need not conform to biological sex.

[silverspirit]

You fallen into the trap. To say Gender is based on self identity, you minimize the role of biological sex. They are inseparable.

Lets imagine you had a boy, and you decided to bring them up as a girl. Do you think that would work? As horrifying as that sounds as an experiment, puberty will hit, and now instead of a girl. you would have a sexually confused boy who identifies as a woman. Your influence would make him a girl, attracted to girls, (unless you raise a gay son).

The primal urge towards sex for gratification, is indeed strong, and can cross genders, I agree. Rape is about sexual gratification, not power. I never raped someone, so This is merely conjectur

[CyberLN]

@silverspirit, in just two posts, you’ve raised transgenderism, feminism, rape, Islam, and adhd.

Please pick one and debate it until it is exhausted and then move to the next one in a separate debate,

[silverspirit]

Sorry, my schizophrenia is playing up. Try being an atheist, when you have the voice of god rattling in you head. He is a dick, real old testament guy.

The debate is nature vs nurture. Can they be separated out from one another. My contention, is they cannot be separated out. I was using transgender ideology as the lens for the debate.

[mordant]

@silverspirit

It is nature plus nurture which makes the human. To deny this is to deny nature itself.

Who is denying this statement, in what context, and why?

If someone says, “gender is a social construct”, and they mean that literally, I think they are oversimplifying but then it has more of a social construct component than most people have contemplated.

People give or deny each other permission to be and act certain ways all the time. It clearly influences perceived gender and sexuality (e.g., people identifying as “gender fluid”). On the other hand, trans and gay people are quite adamant that they are born as they are and it isn’t a whim, and I believe them. The old-timey theories like a gay man had a weak father, have long since been debunked. As the song has it, they are indeed “born that way”.

I don’t think nurture can influence everything. It can influence character, it can produce by turns a centered or anxious person, but in a lot of things I think there are fixed “set points” and you can only push a child a short distance from those. Such as encouraging a profoundly introverted child to be a little more outgoing, or a profoundly extroverted child to be a little more grounded and okay with being alone sometimes without climbing the walls. But you aren’t going to move the needle too much.

It seems like sexual orientation is one of those things that just is what it is. A sexually repressive society will try to force people to be straight, but it’s not really for them to control. People feel what they feel and want what they want when it comes to primal stuff like that. The most nurture can do there is teach people to be inauthentic.

My $0.02 for what it’s worth.

[fireflies]

@silverspirit

You fallen into the trap. To say Gender is based on self identity, you minimize the role of biological sex. They are inseparable.

Gender is what it is. Biological sex is what it is. Acknowledging gender is based on self-identity doesn’t minimise the role of biological sex, if anything, recognising the distinction ensures they both best represent their specific roles.

@silverspirit

Lets imagine you had a boy, and you decided to bring them up as a girl. Do you think that would work? As horrifying as that sounds as an experiment, puberty will hit, and now instead of a girl. you would have a sexually confused boy who identifies as a woman. Your influence would make him a girl, attracted to girls, (unless you raise a gay son).

That’s another over-simplification - nurture can’t be quantified in this manner. You can’t say “do x and get y” - it undermines the innumerable factors that affect an individual, both nature and nurture.

[Sheldon]

@silverspirit

Nature vs Nurture, the title rejected by the website

Nurture is an inherent characteristic of nature, and both influence who we are.

@silverspirit

To me, when saying gender is a social construct, it is a nurture argument, and misses out on the nature aspect. Being gay is a nature argument, as evidenced by homosexuality being found in nature.

A false equivalence, since other species don’t wear clothes, or have access to medical surgery and drugs that can alter their appearance and hormones.

@silverspirit

That gender is a social construct. And that is dangerous.

How so?

@silverspirit

To understand why, we must examine the prevalence of adhd. In olden times we called sufferers naughty.

Prima facie this seems like an oversimplification, we burned people as witches who likely had mental health issues as well, through ignorance.

@silverspirit

Back to gender is a social construct. Saying this confuses children, at a time were they are impressionable.

Does it, it I’d like to see some hard evidence to support this. It seems obvious to me our language is having to adapt to new ideas, and biological sex and gender are starting to diverge.

@silverspirit

And confusion, leads to some children going against their nature, and embracing transexuality. I

That sounds like a slippery slop fallacy to me, and of course even were this true, it wouldn’t alter the fact that gender dysphoria exists.

@silverspirit

It comes with the sunken cost fallacy, which means they are likely to go for surgeries and hormone suppression therapies, all the while being encouraged by the medical community who are beholden to feminist theories.

That is definitely a slippery slop fallacy, but by all means lets have law enacted that protect children from irreversible treatments, and all the while looking to strengthen diagnostic methodologies.

@silverspirit

It is nature plus nurture which makes the human. To deny this is to deny nature itself.

And both seem to be involved in a persons own psychological gender identity.

[Sheldon]

@silverspirit

You fallen into the trap. To say Gender is based on self identity, you minimize the role of biological sex. They are inseparable.

It’s not a trap, and they clearly are separable or we wouldn’t be having this conversation, and the medical profession would view gender dysphoria as a hoax. You seem to have an axe to grind here.

@silverspirit

Lets imagine you had a boy, and you decided to bring them up as a girl. Do you think that would work?

Why would you? Just let the child be itself, that’s the point you seem to be missing, you’re hypothetical also now seems to be at odds with everything you have asserted thus far.

@silverspirit

you would have a sexually confused boy who identifies as a woman. Your influence would make him a girl, attracted to girls,

Based on your crystal ball no doubt, and it’s only you in this thread I have seen advocating raising a child with strict gender roles that would make that child miserable and confused.

@silverspirit

The primal urge towards sex for gratification, is indeed strong, and can cross genders, I agree. Rape is about sexual gratification, not power. I never raped someone, so This is merely conjectur

WTAF? I see no relevance to that last paragraph at all?

@silverspirit

The debate is nature vs nurture. Can they be separated out from one another.

The latter is ubiquitous in nature, that should answer your question.

@silverspirit

I was using transgender ideology as the lens for the debate.

Why? I mean you could have picked toxic masculinity, bullying overbearing male role models, religious fanatics that want to turn children into carbon copies of themselves, why pick on a group that as far as I can see cause no objective harm to anyone?

[Get_off_my_lawn]

@silverspirit

Lets imagine you had a boy, and you decided to bring them up as a girl. Do you think that would work? As horrifying as that sounds as an experiment, puberty will hit, and now instead of a girl. you would have a sexually confused boy who identifies as a woman. Your influence would make him a girl, attracted to girls, (unless you raise a gay son).

What’s the point of this? This is not the typical case, and I would argue that bringing small children up according to the social expectations of the opposite gender is a very marginal phenomenon. Besides, if you bring up the kids “traditionally”, you should see the opposite effect, namely that kids to not experience gender dysphoria, and self-identify and live according to the same gender as assigned at birth. Yet, they are there, even in the most conservative families. Which strongly suggests there is a strong biological component to the whole trans/gender dysphoria case complex.

But I really don’t see why one should bring children up strictly according to stereotypical expectations, anyway. Children are individuals, they are highly adaptive, and they naturally adapt to how society organises the gender role, with only minor input and nudging from the parents. In most cases, this goes “according to expectations”, but sometimes not. If a child has been brought up, being socialised into their accepted social role according to their assigned sex, and still shows behaviour and self-identification as the opposite gender, then one must assume that what is at work is something more than just peer pressure from other kids, parents, and society as a whole, i.e. that there is a biological component to it.

I also have self-observed anecdotal evidence that self-identification as the gender opposite to assigned sex is quite resistant to the upbringing kids are exposed to. These cases are quite typical, with traditional families living traditional lives, following the traditional gender roles expected from society, and yet the kids turn out to have gender dysphoria, and come out as trans children. Again, this suggests that there is a biological component here that decide how individuals experience their gender and gender role.

[Kevin_Levites]

@silverspirit

But the nurture component does exit in the real world, telling young impressionable kids it is ok to be trans. All well and good, but feminism goes on to say, you nature is subservient to your nurture. That gender is a social construct. And that is dangerous.

Why is it dangerous?

I would tell young, impressionable kids that it is OK to be happy as long as it doesn’t hurt other people . . . and I don’t see how accepting trans people in the public sphere hurts anyone.

At this moment, there are so many things wrong with the world (such as climate change, microplastics, mass extinctions, political assassinations, and so forth), that worrying about the social harms of trans acceptance is like rearranging the deck furniture on the Titanic.

Conservatives may bemoan the acceptance of trans people by appealing to “traditional values,” but there have been many times in history when trans people were accepted. As an example, during the 1600s, women were not allowed to perform on stage in England, so all of the female characters in Shakespeare’s plays were originally performed by men in drag.

The right may point to “Biblical” values as a reason to erase trans people from the public sphere, but gender transition surgery even has a Biblical precedent when we consider that God put Adam to sleep and fashioned Eve from one of his ribs . . . as the chromosomes in cells are just as relevant to gender as are a penis or a vagina.

There are also many instances where gender is a grey area . . . such as in Kleinfelter syndrome, where a person has both male and female features due to having an extra ‘X’ chromosome.

Treating gender as a binary absolute of black and white excludes a lot of people who become sentenced to an existence of being a round peg in a square hole.

And if I was a Christian conservative, my values regarding trans people would be predicated on extending acceptance, kindness, and inclusivity in a nonjudgmental manner (which I do anyway).

When I really think about the teachings Jesus Christ, I see someone who would be viewed as a radical, peace-loving hippie (who liked to party) in our modern times . . . not a Christian Nationalist who terrorizes people for being different.

[Sheldon]

@Kevin_Levites

I don’t see how accepting trans people in the public sphere hurts anyone.

My sentiments exactly, the usual criticisms seems aimed at some sort of minority extreme ideology, rather than at trans people themselves.

[Get_off_my_lawn]

@Kevin_Levites

I don’t see how accepting trans people in the public sphere hurts anyone.

@Sheldon

the usual criticisms seems aimed at some sort of minority extreme ideology, rather than at trans people themselves.

My interpretation is that it all boils down to any of the following ways (or a combination) of controlling other people:

• They don’t like it, so noone should be allowed to do it
• They think it’s icky, so noone should be allowed to do it
• They don’t understand it, so noone should be allowed to do it
• They are disturbed by the fact that other people think and behave differently than their own preconceived ideas
• They want to control your thoughts and your behaviour, so they demand that you obey

But in all cases it boils down to controlling others.

[mordant]

@Get_off_my_lawn

But in all cases it boils down to controlling others.

Right, ultimately.

The main subtext in my view is that it somehow threatens their way of life / way of thinking. Like all disagreement, it is seen as an existential threat. It is non-comformant. That must never be.

Fundamentalism is a conformity fetish. They would rather a child with gender dysmorphia be inauthentic and miserable, up to and including suicide. In fact I have read of parents saying they would rather their child die of suicide than become trans.

Nice folks.

[Old_man_shouts_at_cl]

@mordant

Nice folks.

I am having the same kind of discussion with a Magat online. I pointed out that overwhelming majority of sexual assaults are carried out by CIS males (approx 97%+), that the subset of sexual assaults against children is marginally greater majority, again by CIS males.
I also pointed out it seems to be the Rabid Right that is most interested in other peoples genitalia, and therefore pose the most risk to women and children.
He seemed most offended when I asked what kind of measures should society take against such risk? Especially in toilets…