The REAL History of Gender with Dr. Kit Heyam - Factually! - 241
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- Опубликовано: 11 сен 2024
- In recent years, the number of young people identifying as trans has doubled. However, a common misinterpretation arises, suggesting that this surge implies a new phenomenon of being trans or gender non-conforming. Modern Western culture has strongly insisted on the conventional belief that the gender binary is natural, fostering the false assumption that human culture and history have always revolved around this binary. In reality, humans worldwide have expressed gender concepts outside that binary as far back as the 8th century BC. This week, Adam engages in conversation with Dr. Kit Heyam, author of "Before We Were Trans: A New History of Gender," to explore gender expressions of the past and move beyond the limited modern view of gender. Find Kit's book at factuallypod.com/books
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Hermaphrodite
( Male ≠ Female )
Androgynous
H → ( M + F) → A
You can only move down the line.
Wish I had the money to support you for the ad free versions so I didn't have to listen to an ad from a BS food company promoting full on nonsense. :P
Maybe I'm misunderstanding something, but I find it deeply problematic and misogynistic to claim women are not compatible with leadership roles. Forcing women into a subset of society with less power is repressive and misogynistic. I don't know if he just didn't explain what was going on well and am not claiming to understand that culture, but what he said was gross and thoughtless.
@@FuzzyTeddy83 Your opinion is equally gross because it flies in the face of biological reality and history.
@@mariofeathers4194
Kk
I know it was not the main focus of the book, but I'd really like to hear more of what Dr. Heyam has to say about how we came to think so rigidly about gender identity and sexuality
Unexpert opinion here? Colonialism was a huge element of that. I can't really do that topic justice, though.
@@grmpEqweer Expert opinion here: It's a mixture of agriculture, limited resources, (Lerner plus some studying I did on the cultures she skipped), Sexual violence (Caliban and the Witch) and excuses made about those things to limit first women, but then also the rest of LGBTQIA, disabilities and PoC last (at the heels of Al Andalusia) and then spread through religion as an excuse (though it's notable that the church wasn't first on board with it), through subjugation and colonialism--mostly UK and US, but also Spanish, Portuguese and other European nations. BTW, if one wants to know why Europe did colonialism, that goes to Lerner, the type of agriculture practiced, and the setting up of the political system because of that, which I can set up with more sources if you ask.
BTW, if anyone outside of us three wants just to scream and argue... I'm not here for that. Or Big opinion. I do have sources for what I stated and can lay it out nice and slow, including the modification to Lerner's Thesis which I presented for an anthropology class and I got an A on. But if you just want to state big opinion and not engage with the academic side, I'm not likely to reply. I'm merely providing sources for the question to engage with.
If you want to crib my info for a video, at least give me credit. The classes weren't cheap and it might help to have someone with an Anthro degree on your side in the credits?
nazis were very active in defending rigid gender binaries
@@kimyoonmisurnamefirst7061good write up. Thanks for the summation.
More recent, like within the last century, history of the rigid categories has to do with the philosophy of Empiricism getting popular in Europe and then people who studied gender and sexuality trying to slot it into that framework. A combo of early endocrinology emerging from the search for a hormonal "fountain of youth" quickly getting hijacked to try to "cure" homosexuality, and classification systems like Hirschfeld and later Harry Benjamin developed in order to appeal to hegemonic ideas about science in order to legitimize queerness, created a system that relied on pathologization in order to understand difference, and forced nonconforming folks to align with accepted narratives of gender and sexuality in order to pass scientific gatekeepers to get access to care and legal status. This became a self-fulfilling prophecy in which queer people had to fit themselves into categories defined by self-appointed rational men of science, which was then used as evidence for the legitimacy of these categories.
A lot of my knowledge of this history comes from The Pink Triangle by Richard Plant, and Self-Made Men by Henry Rubin
Being trans is like being left-handed. We've always been here, we're just not letting ourselves be beaten into hiding it anymore.
It's crazy to think that being left-handed used to be a stigma. I'd like to think being trans will one day be like that.
As a lefty......... Yeah, I'm glad to have been born to the parents I have. I still write like shit, because I eat, work, and even craft (Use a mouse) right handed, because society, and current market pressures, but yeah, I'm just looking for more andro (But for hands) tools being normalized... xD That'd be nice...
Men who identify as trans or calabai have always existed and they have always been men.
@neil2444 if men who describe themselves as transwomen just argued that they should be accepted as a specific category of men, the tension would dissipate quickly. I advocate they use the beautiful word calabai.
@benjaminfranklin8412 no it wouldn't. Transphobes are already legislating against adults accessing gender affirming care.
I greatly appreciate Dr. Heyam's precaution with using BIPOC cultures to explain the history of trans and non-binary identities for white people. Just as I was beginning to worry they would never bring it up, they began to touch on it towards the beginning of this interview. I just placed Before We Were Trans on hold at my local library ✨ amazing work
Many BIPOC cultures believe that sex is real and gender identity is real. They would never accept this white "transwomen are women" line. They accept that nen have multiple gender options, and women have multiple gender options, but they don't deny the reality of sex.
I want to show Adam the tweet I saw that said "I will never call Twitter X. Elon will finally get to know why deadnames hurt" 😂
Twitter for now and forever will always be X, the platform formally known as Twitter. Of course, it's shorter to just call it Twitter. Same for Elon Musk, Owner of X, platform formally known as Twitter. It's just shorter to call him a Twit.
Twitter
"The platform formally known as Twitter" XD
@@neil2444😂
This comment is so funny because I can guarantee he does not care about people calling it Twitter still. I imagine it was sort of a joke to poke fun at people exactly like you.
Strange how a lot of people don't understand you can't identify as something until you learn about it. It's amazing what being open to new information and education can do for your own mental well being. My wife didn't know she could identify as bi until she learned that it existed. I, a biological male, am gender nonconforming, but didn't know what it was until much later in my life. Doesn't mean we were not these thing before we learned about them, we just didn't know how to put it into words.
You seem to have mistyped there thereby contradicting yourself, so let me roll it up for you: You can be trans/bi/etc without having heard about the concept. Not having a set concept that helps you articulate things does not equate to the thing not existing within you.
Hence the whole "trans propaganda" narrative making all the kids trans, is total horseshite, for example.
@lillywho Yes, thank you. I've edited the comment a couple of times trying to make that clear while using some of my own life experiences. I knew I was different when I was young, but didn't have the words to explain it, and now I do. I just knew that in some ways I felt masculine and in other ways, feminine. Same for my wife, she knew she had feelings for both men and women but due to lack of information, she didn't know that identifying as bi or even more recently as pan was an option for her. She thought she had to choose straight or gay as her only options until it was explained otherwise.
@@lillywho This. We invent new concepts when the existing ones aren't doing a good job of explaining our experiences. Those concepts can also affect our experiences (e.g. dividing human experience into genders leading to people essentializing the exact borders between genders, number of "real" genders, etc.), but what we're seeing with trans and allied folks in the Anglophone world is definitely in the "adjusting concepts to fit the reality we're living" category rather than the other one. (This is also that takeaway from the bit, which I'm glad was included in the video, about how gender models in other contemporary and historical cultures aren't "really" trans/non-binary in the contemporary Western sense. These are all different sets of concepts that people are using to try to make sense of experiences of sex/gender, and they're all culturally-specific to some degree -- but they do illustrate that there are multiple ways to slice the cake, as it were. All we can do is try to come up with a version that's better than the one we can grew up with.)
I'm not LGBTQ, but I can identify with this. I've always known that I was different from everyone else, but never had a word to describe it. I felt like everyone else got The Big Book Of Socializing and I was absent that day. I had to figure things out by trial and error that everyone else got naturally.
Then, my oldest son was diagnosed as being autistic. I decided to read some books to learn what this was since my only previous frame of reference was the movie Rain Man.
Suddenly, all these books were describing things that I did (and still do). Things that I knew were different from everyone else, but that I didn't have a word for.
Before this, I never considered that I could be autistic because my only exposure to Autism was Rain Man and that wasn't me. But I suddenly realized that Autism encompassed so much more and fit me perfectly.
I haven't gotten a formal diagnosis for various reasons (mainly because it costs money that I can't afford to spend on that), but I have zero doubts that I'm autistic. Before learning about what autism actually was, though, I wouldn't have been able to say this. Similarly, if someone who is LGBTQ never had the words to say "I'm gay" or "I'm trans," it wouldn't mean that they aren't. It would just mean that they couldn't express this properly in our modern context.
Though, like in the video, this can be tricky when applied to historical figures. This happens with autism also. There are so many people in history who show signs of being autistic, but you can't say for certain because they aren't around anymore to accept or reject a label.
@@Techydad Absolutely. My wife got her autism diagnosis when she was 43, but we knew for years before that. A lot of people will give you grief for self diagnosing, but as you said, it costs money to see the professionals to get the diagnosis. We wouldn't have been able to afford to get her or any of my own diagnoses without insurance. Not to mention trying to find a psychologist that is even willing to test adults for autism. I will say that once she got the diagnosis it was a relief to her that a professional concurred with our assessment as well. We truly need medicaid for all so that we can get the care we need to be the people we want to be.
Finding representation in history is so important, even if the terms are different.
When I was in the 2nd or 3rd grade my music teacher taught us about different composers in history and would tell us stories about them. When she got to Chopin, she told us that for a few years he had a lover named George Sand. George Sand was an AFAB French writer who dressed in men's clothes, went by a man's name, and would lie under Chopin's piano and smoke cigars while he composed.
As a young child, I wasn't yet aware that I was trans and gay. But learning about George Sand really stuck with me. Even before knowing what transgender was as a concept, just knowing about this person in history that was born a woman but moved through society as a man a lot of the time AND still had relationships with men was really important to me.
While I'll never truly know how George Sand saw themselves, their story will always be important to me. Even before I had the words to describe myself, I saw part of myself in that image of them in men's clothes, smoking under Chopin's piano.
Thanks for sharing, are you a writer? Loved how you told your story
@@BoldeBarde Wow, thank you so much! I do write short stories, but just as a hobby, not professionally.
I'm a molecular scientist, so all of my professional writing is pretty boring. 😆
That was a really wonderful read. I didn't know about George Sand and will look up more about him later, but I loved how you wrote it. I'm not trans or gay, but I could feel little you in me relating to this person. Thanks for sharing.
I concur with what others are saying:
You are a skilled story teller, and as a non-binary person, I appreciate learning about this historical figure I've never heard of before. Thank you for sharing, and you should definitely write more stuff ^-^
i actually came across Chopin and Sand's affairs when playing Eternal Sonata on the PS3. it's a weird JRPG, but after concluding a chapter within the game's story, there were these miniature breaks in-between where we, the audience, learn about Chopin's life as a musician, among other aspects that shaped his music, while being accompanied by some of his most famous musical compositions played on piano.
This is so cool to listen to! As a biologist, my education was more focused on how messy, complicated, and fuzzy the idea of biological sex is. Though definitely not the same thing as gender, there are ties between the two, and it's cool to see that gender is also messy and fuzzy and complicated. I wouldn't have it any other way!
Biological sex is not fuzzy.
Men who identify as trans or calabai have always existed and they have always been men.
@benjaminfranklin8412 incorrect.
I suggest you start listening to geneticists (and not just ones that confirm your bias).
Read and listen to all of them and then realize that the simplistic statement of sex being binary is simply untrue because there is too much science to refute such a simplistic view.
@@-Subtle- any geneticist who isn't aware that babies are only made through the combination of the only two gametes our species produces is a quack. We produce two gametes. Two, sexual reproduction is the combination of our two gametes, two. I have talked to geneticists. They cannot point to any instance where a human baby who has been naturally produced by a human who has formed a third type of gamete. We humans only create two. Two. Stop listening to quacks. Two. Binary.
@@-Subtle- genetic and congenital variations is not evidence of a third sex. You are reading the works of quack. No scientific research has proven the evolution of a third sex. You would have to provide evidence of a genetica mutation that created evidence of a human that created a new gamete and the successfully reproduced with that gamete in order to declare a third sex. You are reading the works of quacks that have altered the definition of sex. We have genetic and congenital variations of males. We have genetic and congenital variations of females. We do not have a third sex.
Frustrating that such a wealthy country can't manage to educate its own population. I grew up as a refugee in 'developing' patriarchal countries in Asia for most of my childhood and always understood gender isn't binary. Not to mention, were all born looking and being built so darn different and unique, how dim do you have to be to think that stops at the underoos? Why can't Americans learn and take away from other experiences? This ignorance has got to be intentional. So grateful for Adam's work.
The word is new-ish. What it describes is not. For example, back in the day, I was called a tomboy, not transgender. One term or another, it has always been noted that, while female, I am different to a girl/woman. My personal take is that the concept of genders has been very damaging due to its restrictions and we'd be better off without them altogether.
So are you claiming that every girl who is what would have been described as a tomboy is actually trans? I find it silly to define one's genders by what kind of things you enjoy doing. A girl is not a boy because she likes robots and dinosaurs. She's just a girl that likes cool stuff.
Some people feel gender very lightly or not at all. Others feel it intensely and passionately. In both cases, it is very hard for one of these groups to accept that the lived experience of the other is genuine and not the product of some process that society can control. Closeted gay pastors make this mistake all the time; they assume that their urges and attractions are temptations that everyone feels but have to be resisted for the good of society. A similar phenomenon is (probably) true for gender. If we try to destroy it, we will actually be repressing a lot of people, many of them trans.
It’s wild how anti trans adds are played before this video 🙄 Thank you for bringing Dr. Heyam, I think they are such an amazing writer. I read the book thinking I had a good understanding of the different ways genders are expressed and it blew my mind on how much more there is to be learned.
I've noticed that a lot from other trans creators I watch, those anti-trans ads are definitely targeted towards us and meant to harm. it's such a shame old white cis men can be filled with so much hate
I get transphobic adds on occasion because the algorithm knows I am interested in transgender issues, but doesn't know that transphobic commercials are offensive to people who are transgender or support transgender people.
@foebok the people who make the ads actually pick which demographics they want their ad to be served to. They purposefully target people they know will be upset as a marketing tactic, hoping that they'll make posts calling them out.
I literally subscribe to the most progressive and socialist channels and I get ads for bizarre right wing conspiracy channels like the Epoch Times which even some Republicans find insane.
you should report that, then.
I love the point you both made about how gender and self expression should be low-stakes. Our bodies are just the little avatars we use to navigate the world, and we should be able to customize them and use them however we want! 😂❤ it shouldn’t have to be such a big deal if you want to change things up
Agreed! It’s called freedom! Funny how some of the people who claim to be all about freedom hate it when people express their gender freely.
@@Sdewebb No, we won't. Try and stop us. Mwahahaha!
@@Sdewebb If you're gonna be a ridiculous idiot then I get to be one too. Fairs turn about play is!
Definitely. I do think the argument is more nuanced for some, however. In those cases, I have seen some people saying that people can do what they want after a certain age - not that there aren’t glaring holes in that argument as well, but just thought I’d nuance the convo
So stop forcing taxpayers to pay for your vain avatar customization through health services while demanding special class protection. It's either a legit disorder that needs medical treatment, or sewing your flayed forarm to your crotch while chugging cross-sex hormones is a fun little pasttime activity to sprinkle some personal flair over your body. You can't have your cake and eat it too
This was a great discussion. And Twitter is the _only_ thing it's okay to deadname. 😂
I'm 54 and have been in transition for 9 years. HAPPILY and enthusiastically, never going back. I was dealing with the frightening and unexplainable behaviors that dysphoria led me to undertake, in the late 1970's. I DID NOT acquire my trans-ness from social media or television. My example in 1979 was CORPORAL EFFING KLINGER. I was rolling up tube socks and compulsively stuffing my shirt with them at age 11.
Corporal Klinger was the bomb 🪖
I don't know if you want to compare trans people to Klinger though. If conservatives start thinking trans people can eat Jeeps they might be that much worse.
Trans rights, and trans THRIVING.
Elon deadnames his own child - always call it Twitter
6:06 I think it's also important to address intersex,that there is a portion of the population that is born not completely in one category of gender, that some people don't even know they're intersex(even if it's a small population) till they have an ultrasound/try for a child, that it's not so cut and dry. There's also kids that need hormone therapy to live, banning gender affirming care just puts those kids at risk. Just like banning abortions, because banning abortions puts people who have a growth in their uterus in danger because they may not be able to get rid of it naturally,and risk chronic pain/bleeding for the rest of their life.
That's a great comment about hormone therapy, and I believe it's a crucial debate point. It's important to be weary of overperscriptions of puberty blockers to children by overzealous doctors. Much like when ADHD was discovered and Adderall was overperscribed to children in the past.
@@mugenryukyu5473 The interesting thing about ADHD is that it is BOTH underdiagnosed and overdiagnosed. What happens is that we diagnose ADHD based on a proxy: doing well or poorly in school. So the people who do poorly in school for reasons other than ADHD get overdiagnosed and overprescribed, and the people who are able to do well in school despite ADHD are underdiagnosed and underprescribed. We need to fix both issues simultaneously: we should strive for all of the people who have ADHD to have access to Adderall, and for all of the people who don't have ADHD to not be needlessly put on Adderall and instead get whatever help they DO need.
I believe the same thing about hormone blockers: we should strive to give access to hormone blockers to all of the people who benefit from them, and all of the people who don't benefit them should instead get whatever other help they need.
My now 8yo son told us he was a boy at 3yo.
When we needed his birth certificate for school, we noticed it had him as "male," which made it significantly easier for us when, in the first year of school, he cut off all his hair and requested a different name.
As it turns out, he has xy chromosomes, and female presentation.
I had always thought that intersex was visible externally, which is not always the case.
Since watching my son, I would argue that all trans people are intersex. We have a "reason" that (frustratingly) people find more "acceptable" for our son being trans, but half a century ago we wouldn't have had that reason. I don't believe he is any "more" trans than the person without a medical diagnosis.
The term intersex is an antiquated term we now know is misleading. You seem to not understand that some men are born with genetic or congenital variations or disorders. They are still men. Some women are born with genetic or congenital variations. They are still women. We are a binary species.
@@Denidrakes69no. Just no. Trans and intersex are too entirely different things. Some trans people are intersex, but not all. Some intersex people are trans, but not all. I'm intersex, 47xxy, but not trans. While it is possible to be both, you cannot conflate the two.
And if you're not a medical doctor, you shouldn't be making a medical diagnosis. Just because someone is trans, does not mean they have one of the 40 or so medical conditions that make somebody intersex. And even if you are a medical doctor, you shouldn't be making broad medical diagnoses for millions of people you've never met.
'All human understanding is based on the simplification of more complex realities.' - Bill James
felt very heard and seen by this interview. thank you adam for platforming kit, and thank you kit for doing such great work for us in the queer community ♥️🏳️⚧️
To add to the fact that people had different conceptions on sex, gender, and sexuality, people were trying to justify their existence to normative society. They might not have seen themselves exactly how they described themselves due to this. Kinda like how we used to say that we were trapped in the wrong body.
People who are insecure are always trying to punch down on anyone who doesn’t look, speak or believe as they do. Some sort of twisted self-validation? Authenticity is resistance💪🏽
People need to mind their own business. Who cares what someone else identifies as? Or what religion or lack there of? Usually folks preaching about "freedom " that try to deny it to everyone else 😢
Their idea of freedom includes their freedom to oppress others, and force their moral code onto everyone else.
Does a woman have a right not to have to shower or change clothes in front of a biological man in the woman's bathroom?
So stop with the fear-mongering, bullsh@t Nobody is taking away women's spaces and as a woman myself when I go into a public bathroom or lockerroom, I don't see men in there at all let alone a transgender person.
You haven't seen the video of that asshole at the airport yet I'm assuming? This is nonsense. I just can't take this guy seriously anymore.
@@colt5189
Why aren't there individual shower stalls and changing booths?
WHY?
WHY are those not a thing?
I'm pansexual.
(and female nonbinary, that and 5 bucks will get me a coffee)
I was a h0rny teen.
I have memories of frantically staring at the walls of the high school locker room, so my eyes wouldn't be accidentally drawn to the roomful of boobs in bras, and I wouldn't get my butt kicked.
God, I hated that. I was so frightened, ashamed, and disgusted with myself back then; it was the 80's, in Texas.
Anyway, I think there ought to be a lot more privacy in lockers and showers for everyone.
Pro trans rights here, just going to throw in a story about human nature. Saw a wildlife documentary a while ago about flying foxes, like squirrels who glide from tree to tree with skin 'wings'. A local tribal group hunts all other creatures for food but the foxes were taboo. Even in times of famine. The reason they gave was basically "they aren't birds, they aren't animals - whoa, leave them alone" no bucket to suit!
It's amazing how humans not only invent systems of categories to understand the world, but also develop rituals to deal with things that don't fit into the categories.
@levibee9451 The world is really too complicated. Humans shortcut so much thinking on "general principles". It's stupid, but unfortunately - or actually, fortunately - it works. We probably have to unpick some of that...
@levibee9451 all mammals know how reproductive sex works.....not just humans
As a transgender nonbinary person I really really appreciate you covering this. I use three sets of pronouns and have a complex experience with gender. Thank you for shutting down the transphobic rhetoric and homophobic rhetoric. Thank you for stating facts and looking at the history of gender across the globe.
Many BIPOC cultures believe that sex is real and gender identity is real. They would never accept this white "transwomen are women" line. They accept that nen have multiple gender options, and women have multiple gender options, but they don't deny the reality of sex.
I had a good professor once say the things you see people argue and disagree about now are the same disagreements from when I was growing up too. None of this stuff is new :)
Not new, yet still new to many!
it's okay to deadname brands like twitter lol
Well a brand is not a person so...
This comments section is a little unhinged. I wish I were surprised, but of course, any video on the topic of gender, and there are people wandering around trying to prove that sex is inherently binary (it isn’t), that gender isn’t really a construct (it is).
Friendly reminder that it’s okay to have been wrong about something. It’s not a moral failing to not be perfect, and you don’t have to prove you’re always right to be worth something.
Just listen, and try to learn. There’s a reason people think about sex and gender this way.
And if you’re religious, and you’ve grown up being told you’ll be condemned if you ask questions or change your mind-don’t forget, there’s more than one way to be a person of faith.
What is the other sex?
@@chuckles9767 That's not a sex. All intersex people are either male or female.
@@chuckles9767 That is an offensive example and it's also completely wrong. Their bodies may not have developed in a typical way, but they are still one of the 2 sexes.
@@chuckles9767 ok
@@aidanearlmy son has xy chromosomes and female genitalia. What's he?
I just want to say kudos to Dr. Kit for having a poster of the stellar Tennant and Tate "Much Ado About Nothing" production.
man i would want to be treated like Adam treats Kit in this interview if I had written a book.
Yeah Adam is a great interviewer!
On the topic of putting people into our modern buckets, I think it's a fair thing to do to help people understand. But it is also important to point out that those aren't the buckets they would have used. And yeah, those will change over time, but I feel it is important to do. If for no other reason than to track how those buckets shift and change over time.
Re: The messiness of being trans.
I'm a gay trans man.
I'd long been attracted primarily to gay men, but felt guilty about it. My most significant relationship was with a gay man (when I was still living as a woman).
I'd long understood my gender to not fit ordinary buckets, and grabbed onto any character in fiction who was able to shift genders. When I did encounter trans people, the only trans men I knew were *literally* a construction worker, a body builder, and a cowboy.
It wasn't until *RE*reading bell hooks that I realized I'd internalized ideas about masculinity that I was applying to myself which I didn't even remotely apply to my friends.
And when I realized I'm a man, then I realized I'm a gay man. And my masculinity is soft, but that doesn't make me any less of a man.
.
I also know many trans men and trans masc folks who came out of the Lesbian community and still identify as lesbians.
It's complicated.
Trans woman here: for a long time I would become attracted to someone only to find out they were a lesbian. It happened several times. I felt shameful because I thought I was being a "gross chaser" but it turned out I didn't know myself yet
Make sure the people you date know you are trans immediately. There are plenty of gay men and lesbian women who would object to dating trans men and trans women, and the later you leave telling them, the worse the embarrassment will be if one side isn't into it.
@@martineyles we're not going around "tricking" people into dating us, but thank you for the unsolicited advice
@@martineyles
Gee golly. I've never encountered a lesbian or gay person who didn't want to date trans people. I couldn't possibly decide when it's safe and prudent to share my personal medical information with someone I'm dating. Sure is a good thing you're here to tell me.
@@tyghe_bright There are several youtube channels by gay people who object to dating trans people. mrmenno and magdalenberns for example. I doubt they're the only gay and lesbian people who would object. I'm just surprised people don't know there might be consent issues.
The way Adam laughed at "twitter" lmao
In indian culture, Hinjra itself have been treated pretty poorly.
Yes they have recognition but they've been relegated to the position of beggers. Sure the narrative does assist them in getting a Decent amount to make a living but it's begging nonetheless
I'm curious if that stigmatizing is a relatively recent (like, since the start of English colonialism in India) or if it goes back further? I'm not knowledgeable about India but I know that the European empires that tended to spread Christianity also spread their own gender and sexuality systems and in many places such as the Americas and Africa, deliberately degraded the situation of indigenous non-western gender systems and the people whose genders didn't make intuitive sense to them.
@@levibee9451 I haven't made an in depth study on them so it would be wrong to make any sort comment on it.
I'll research it and then let you know but as of today this is their condition, in fact hinjra is a slang in colloquial hindi, so make of it what you will
@@levibee9451it goes back further, im sorry to tell you but every culture has affirmed the gender binary, even if i belive the gender binary is false: they were hated even before the british got there: *please watch* the older videos of *veritas et caritas* about native peoples videws of gender (also the person here also partly talks about it here at the start but does not fully say it)
its a 3 year old video called “indigenous gender & sexuality”, and also the video after that
As someone who currently considers themself to be a genderfluid femboy, I absolutely love this interview (and I did check out that book from my local Library). I think the best way to think about this is gender self-determination as a bodily autonomy and self-expression right, instead of medicalizing gender.
I enjoy most of Adam's interviews, some other experts, authors, activists, and thinkers that I would suggest interviewing include: Jesse Bering, Joseph Margulies, Nathan Robbinson, Robert Sapolsky, and Rutger Bregman.
Many BIPOC cultures believe that sex is real and gender identity is real. They would never accept this white "transwomen are women" line. They accept that nen have multiple gender options, and women have multiple gender options, but they don't deny the reality of sex.
The thing I got out of this is that Trans-ness and Gender in general is a much more complex thing than it has been made out to be.
We all know the narrative of living in a 2-gender society and a trans person saying they feel like they were born a different gender than their sex. But it's much more nuanced than that. What we are born as is not a black and white thing. And our society's understanding of gender is not really parallel to any society/culture's understanding of gender throughout history. Be it black & white or gray & nuanced, it varies greatly in every place and time.
And the biggest thing I got here is that being "trans" is not just about the way you were born. It can be fluid and can change. It is nuanced and complicated. It doesn't matter what your reason was for becoming a different gender or how long you did it. That doesn't have any affect on the validity of it. That is all a way of being "transgender" and it is all okay.
I hate how just being respectful of other is too much to ask some, yet they enjoy the respect they deny others.... as if you could shame someone straight?!?.
I love the explanation about how a person from a non-patriarchial society would view moving between gender roles. Reminds me of a great statement about homophobia being intertwined with misogyny: "If you see women as lesser, then the worst thing a boy can do is be like a 'girl'".
Growing up in the 70s and 80s in the United States, the only trans anything I was ever aware of was transvestite and transsexual. I never knew anyone who was either of these things, to my knowledge, and I never had any real exposure to them in general. Suddenly, over the past few years, now we have all these new genders popping up and new terms exploding onto social media and so many new flags and adding more letters to the LGBT thing and everyone is bothered by pronouns for some reason. It's just all so confusing and overwhelming and I can't keep up. I've considered myself gay for most of my life and it's gotten me in trouble a few times, but I never really thought of it as a big deal. It's just part of who I am, but it doesn't define me as a person. I guess I just don't see why some of the issues with this stuff are issues. I'm not transphobe or anything, I'm all for anyone should be what they feel they need to be, I just don't understand why the issue seems bigger than it needs to be. Maybe if there were people explaining all this stuff, it would help with the confusion surrounding the issue. I'm sure that I'm not the only one with this confusion and it may be that those who are opposed to this stuff may be acting out of confusion or misunderstanding of the "movement" or whatever you want to call it. Instead of one side attacking the other and the other side retaliating and everyone throwing hate and negativity around, some understanding and compassion would help to break down the barriers around this. Education to alleviate confusion and misunderstanding is the best way to become more accepted in society, in my opinion.
Sorry if gender stuff makes you feel a little uncomfortable. I know trans people who literally had to flee their home state due to government crackdowns. Schools and hospitals are receiving bomb threats. People are being violently attacked in restrooms for not presenting enough like their gender for someone else's liking. But I'm sure you have it very hard too.
@@nolancheck1465 That's all terrible and I'm not uncomfortable with gender, I just find it confusing. No one should be attacked or threatened for being themselves. As I said, I'm not transphobe and everyone should be able to live as they please, but I don't think being overly flamboyant about your lifestyle to a world that doesn't actually care doesn't really help your cause. Sorry if that sounds harsh, but I don't know how else to say it. You want to be seen? Ok that's fair. You want special rights? What rights exactly do you want? I'm just not sure what the end goal here is. Like I said, it might help to alleviate confusion for those who don't understand if there were people trying to educate for what it is they want rather than just drying about getting hurt or being offended if someone uses a pronoun they are not comfortable with. You want to be recognized, educate the public as to what you want recognized for. The burden for recognition is not on the public. It is not the public's duty to figure out what you or your group want and you can't expect the public or each person to automatically know what pronoun you prefer to be called. I have called myself gay for almost 50 years, but I have never felt the need to grab a label or feel like I am special or different from everyone else. I have only ever had to survive the bullying and torture f growing up in a world that didn't like me for just being myself. I never tried to stand out and I have survived to now by just living my life and keeping to myself. If you want to draw attention to yourself, that's fine, but don't cry when the attention you get isn't the favorable kind that were hoping for.
@@glenjennettwhy is this confusing? Gender nonconforming people want basic respect, dignity and civil rights *without* having to "keep it to themselves" or sit in the back of the bus. If it seems more complicated, that's only because right-wing hatemongers have made it their mission to make this seem more complicated than it really is.
I do understand what you mean as far as feeling like there are new terms and ideas that we didn't have when we were kids. I grew up in the 70s and a lot of things have changed since then. Unfortunately, a lot of prejudices are still the same, just wrapped up in a new label now. I can see Anita Bryant being welcomed with open arms right now. :(
If you are any part of the LGBTQ+ community, then you understand that knowledge on issues and terms are constantly being updated. Think of the difference between the 50s and the 70s. It was a whole different world and way of thinking. Now realize that was only 20 years apart. It's been 50 years since those outdated thoughts of the 70s.
We have to keep learning, growing and willing to accept each other as individuals if we actually want to cooperate to make life better for all of us.
Peace and love for you in your life.
The fact is that this - like just about everything else - has been heavily politicized, and is used by both the left and the right as an intentional point of division. Just another thing to drive us apart and get us to fight with each other, so that we have less energy to spend on more important matters.
There are a lot of folks out there who like to be able to paint others as the bad guy and themselves as the victim, and they have very little tolerance for people who don't instantly understand and agree with everything they say.
They get a weird little dopamine rush by labeling people are the bad guys, and an even bigger rush if they can get them cancelled for it.
And like everything else, they are used by the elite to distract and divide us so we spend our energy on this very unimportant issue, while the professional propagandists spin everything to get us to give them practically the entire planet and all of our lives to do with as they please and use as their play thing.
And if you think the democrats are not intentionally stoking these flames just as much as the republicans, you're just another in the army of fools keeping us all enslaved with your ignorance.
I feel like this needs to be said at least once since the comments seem to be so hung up on this, so im gonna say it nice and clear: Gender is not sex. You are born with SEXUAL characteristics, GENDER is what the discussion is about, which may include sexual characteristics in the conversation, but again GENDER IS NOT BIOLOGICAL!
Exactly. It's a social construct that is currently changing.
So I've thought about this too. I feel like people will say this but then asked to be treated as if they are the sex that our society typically associates with that gender.
I think we could get past a lot of this people said "I'm a feminine male" instead of "I'm a man" and such.
@@F2t0ny I suspect that this style of categorization started with birth certificates with the term: "gender."
Sex categories are also a social construct.
@@levibee9451 so when scientists created sex categories for different animal species, that we was for social purposes, or was it categorize the part of an animal or plant species that produced the ovum and the part of the species that produced spermatozoa?
Excellent interview! Dr. Heyam’s book is now on my “to buy” list.
I love this episode. I will read this book. I have conversations with people regularly where I am trying to explain that the LGBTQ+ community is not new. Especially regarding Transgender and non-binary people. I am non-binary but didn't know that until I reached adulthood. I asked my parents about it as a child. Like" Hey guys sometimes I feel like a boy, I would like some lego sets please" Them, " Hhmm, no you're a girl, here's a doll." We have always been here but not always able to speak up. Thankfully I am in a relationship where I can express myself.
Girls can and do like playing with lego. Boys can and do dislike playing with lego. Whether someone wants lego really tells you nothing about their gender.
I can relate, even though I'm not LGBTQ. I've always known that my brain worked differently from other people's. It was only when I was an adult and my son was diagnosed that I learned what autism is. Suddenly, I had a word (and a community) that fit who I am. I wasn't some "weirdo who refused to be normal." I'm autistic. But before I had that word/description? I was still autistic - I just couldn't express who I was properly.
I appreciated the nuanced approach that Dr. Heyman takes. Sadly I feel that the discussion mostly almost entirely lacks nuance (including people who I agree with about supporting human rights for people that aren't binary or gender typical). There's a great deal of people talking past each other, and assuming the worst motives from the other. While there's clearly people who are bigots, there are also people who understand the sex/gender distinction differently (linguistically as opposed to factually), and there are legitimate concerns about how much of how we define ourselves and each other should be according to our own preferences or in the context of our larger culture, not to mention discussions about if we should be trying to change our culture regarding gender ideas.
There is not really a debate on this, though. There are two groups of people who should be discussing this: patients with gender dysphoria, and their doctor. That's it. I don't care what unassociated third parties think, the care doesn't impact them and doesn't mean to their lives, what our identities mean to us.
And it's a BAD-FAITH debate, let's not skip over that part. The ONLY DEBATE over trans-affirming or gender-affirming care I ever want to hear is going to start with "I have a procedure that treats these symptoms more effectively than the one commonly employed, of gender-affirming procedures." And it better finish with "here is a detailed description of the treatment, and peer-reviewed studies show that it is a superior alternative." If the debate DOES NOT START with that statement, and end with the next one, it is a bad-faith, shit-mouth takedown of our care with no concern for the symptoms that it leaves us with.
@@angelainamarie9656 I agree that the subject of gender affirming care is a medical subject, and should only be had between 1) doctors and patients, 2) medical associations like the AMA, and 3) people who research on the subject academically.
Surely you've heard that there is more discussions surrounding issues of non-binary or atypical genders than just gender affirming care? I have heard a great deal of discussion about pronouns, for example. That's actually a subject that I think deserves a little nuance but seems to get none. I also hear an incredibly depressing amount of debate about biological sex and whether it is largely binary or not, used as a proxy for discussions about gender. In these discussions I frequently see people being called bigots for claiming that biological sex is largely binary (a question of fact, not a question about attitudes toward non-binary people). I mean I also hear the bigotry and the stubborn refusal to consider the distinction between sex and gender, but I suspect that this comment section is going to have people more likely to err on the side of reactively accusing people of bigotry than of actual bigotry.
When left-wing activists discuss trans issues exclusively in terms of medical procedures, liberals like Destiny can come in and very effectively call their bluff with trans-medicalism. There's obviously a broader debate going on about the meaning of gender, and how flexible our categories should be. For me, trans-medicalism is a perspective that helps me understand why we need to be more flexible with gender than other meaningful categories like race or social class --- because there are at least some people who really *need* to cross the boundary. But it's not the whole story.
@@tradfluteman Yes. I think your last sentence is my point.
@@johngaunce On your point overall, I can't help but be struck by the variety of people in these comment sections. Some find gender an inconvenience and want to get rid of it, because they never felt particularly strongly about it; others like gender, but feel constrained by just one set of expectations. Still others have suffered a lot from feeling like they've been assigned the wrong gender, and want the freedom to live their preferred way. They present a united front, but their motivations are fundamentally different.
I come from the perspective of someone who (1) feels his gender strongly, and (2) is attracted to the opposite gender, strongly. Not the opposite sex: the opposite gender, with all that entails. So it's fair to say that I *like* gender, and it's a positive force in my life, as it probably is for most people. I also became aware of these feelings very early, before I had my opinion made on most things, so to a good first approximation they are innate.
We need to understand where everyone comes from before we can negotiate social norms. We're especially bad at this these days because the people we listen to are literally invested in our prejudices and will tell us that our perspectives are either universal or morally right. Either way: no work required. We don't learn that our perspectives are one of many other (genuine) perspectives, and that the only fundamentally just state is compromise.
Very interesting. I always marvel at how people say being intersex is a small percentage so they don't want to include them as as being able to be non-binary. It's like they want to pretend millions of people don't exist so they can continue being ignorant. I'm not sure if this is mentioned during the interview but most of us have a pocket uterus or penis. We all start out as embryos as females.
My 8yo son is trans and intersex. He has xy chromosomes and was assumed female at birth. Interestingly, his birth certificate has him as male, something we didn't pick up until two years after he began telling us he was a boy (he and his twin were our surprise 4th and 5th children. Life was hectic!)
Things are only externally beginning to change now. He appears to be starting puberty with growth around the breast area as well as down below. Had there not been, what we'd presumed was a mistake on his birth certificate, we likely wouldn't have known. What annoys me the most is that people are much more accepting of what they view as a medical issue, than had he been trans with no known "cause." Yet, I think it's all the same. When it comes to trans people, we disconnect the brain from the rest of the body far too much.
The term intersex is an antiquated term we now know is misleading. You seem to not understand that some men are born with genetic or congenital variations or disorders. They are still men. Some women are born with genetic or congenital variations. They are still women. We are a binary species.
We do not all start out as females. Embryo genes can be tested for male of female. Your information is antiquated.
@@Denidrakes69why is it more frustrating that people value verifiable evidence over feelings?
@@benjaminfranklin8412 because there's a whole lot our brain does that's involuntary. I don't believe that people who are trans have a choice.
There are women, like my son, who don't know they have xy chromosomes until they realise they can't fall pregnant and tests prove the reason . They are still women. My son is still my son.
Although it appears my son has a reason, his brain plays just as big a part. He hates it. But he can't change it.
Outstanding episode. I learned more than I thought I already knew and can better speak to this topic now. Thank you!
I'm elated you mentioned David Graeber's work toward the end 🏴 Really wish he was still around...
I'm definitely requesting this book to be added to the catalog at my public library, lol. And as someone who's 2S, I'm curious to see if it's an identity she talks about in her work, too. Thank you, Adam and Kit, for such an awesome interview!
Celebrating diversity is never unnatural.
Pushing a gender on a child is, no matter if it’s the gender that is in sinc with their physical sex or not. Children have no gender. Their gender will reveal itself in time if they are safe and autonomous.
But it doesn’t have to be a big deal. It’s a part of your identity, but there is so much more to a person than their gender.
Telling a male child he is male is good parenting.
@@benjaminfranklin8412 telling, yes, especially when he asks you. But forcing your child to ‘act’ masculine, play with cars and never dolls, wear ‘boy’ clothes when they clearly aren’t happy is unneccesary.
@@Peacefrogg Well of course a boy should play with whichever toys are fun for him. But his toy choices don't determine if he is a boy or girl. His reproductive structure and genetics do.
@@Peacefrogg I don't care if a boy is masculine. What I care about is people telling him feminine toys or behavior determine if he is a boy or a girl. He can play with dolls and wear a dress and prefer the name Emilia and his body will still mean he is a boy. Only sex determines if someone is a boy. Feelings are irrelevant.
@@benjaminfranklin8412 your sex is determined by genes. Gender is a bit more complex for some people. Respecting that is not hard.
I think we need to recognize it isn't just "looking back to ways of thinking that we lost" because that may not fully apply to all gender related circumstances, such as neo pronouns or further gender expansive folks. It's good to recognize that it's a recognition of the past, AND a recognition of the ability to change for the future.
A way that I think of it is that non-cis identities are timeless and infinitely variable 🌸
This episode should be called "Adam ruins the Binary" 🥰
Or alternatively, Adam ruins his reputation?
I liked this episode very much and I feel seen as a PoC NB. Shamanism today still uses gender nonconforming behavior to often access the divine. I know it's true at least for Korean traditional shamanism: Mugyo. (Saying this as a Korean.) Also kinda makes me wonder if old Shamanistic religions of europe also had gender nonconforming as part of their rituals as well--though I suppose the archaeological record isn't very pointed on this account so we might never know.
I can almost guarantee there were transgender witches, and though I have no proof I think a lot of Celtic druids must have been some type of nonconforming
In Heathenism, magic is considered feminine. However, in the eddas, loki and Odin have access to these magics- though Loki takes on a more GNC role among the gods. While Odin is criticized for using magic (magic being feminine) because he is written as a man.
I'm very curious about queer history in the viking age. There's clearly stories of sexually and gender, but a lot of the vikings history was lost or rewritten after Christianity. So some history we will never truly know since a lot of queer history has been regularly destroyed.
@@Rey-it3sg I often wonder if Druids were straightwashed. I loosely know about Loki, etc, but it kinda feels like the straight washed the good'uns, and I'd like to have seen if the older Gods were more like the Greco Roman ones and letting bisexuality and gender nonconformity (well, modern terms, but going into the nuance to get the correct term is too long.) flow more.
Egyptian myth also had some BL and GL going to. SO I have no doubts that there probably was more queer in the older records, but the question is how... and can we find evidence for it and as the video said, can we approach it from their PoV? Personally I love, love seeing different expressions of queerness.
Many BIPOC cultures believe that sex is real and gender identity is real. They would never accept this white "transwomen are women" line. They accept that nen have multiple gender options, and women have multiple gender options, but they don't deny the reality of sex.
It’s important to note that the sentence, while kinda empowering, is a form of identification enforcement. It’s kinda like the thing with the Jewish armband enforcement or other anti-Semitic methods of enforcement to make someone stand out. Idk if that’s what the sentence was supposed to accomplish, but there’s a history behind enforced identification
And, staying in Nazi Germany, the LGBTQ people were one of the first groups attacked. They had to wear pink triangle armbands also so that everyone could see that they were "not normal" by the rules that the Nazis set as being "normal." Personally, if you're not conforming to what Nazis say is "normal," I'd say that's a good thing. But in Nazi Germany, not fitting in could get you beaten or worse.
The problem with studying gender (touched on a little here) is that because it is sociological as society changes so does gender, and each society has its own concept of gender, and how gender fits within society. Jews historically have had 8 genders, with men at the top and there being greater restrictions on the other genders. Hinduism has different genders based on region. Buddhism names 4 genders (the Buddha told monks not to have sex with any of the 4 genders), but one of them is actually just "sex worker." There is also a category for intersex people carried over from Hinduism, but many Bodhisattvas are androgynous or change genders.
It is similar to how the ancient world didn't really have a word for "gay" because same sex relationships were just normal back then. The history of gender is one of a history in changing conceptions of gender.
"It is similar to how the ancient world did really have a word for 'gay' because same sex relationships were just normal back then."
Very true. Same-sex relations and acts were things you DID, not something you WERE. The LGBTQ identities we have today are only new in that are *identities*. We have always behaved in these myriad of ways, but we didn't always define ourself by our behavior in that way. I think there are pros and cons to this. In a way, I don't like the idea that everything I do is analyzed by others to slot me into an identity, or that I need to find a term that describes my experience. I just want to be and do things. Love who I want, dress how I want.
That is why we should disregard gender and just use sex to determine who we are.
Many BIPOC cultures believe that sex is real and gender identity is real. They would never accept this white "transwomen are women" line. They accept that nen have multiple gender options, and women have multiple gender options, but they don't deny the reality of sex.
This is exactly why I sometimes dislike the absurd amount of "gender identity labels". We have this weird obsession with categorizing absolutely everything, that we often forget that life and people are too unique to give an exact label.
On top of that, gender is just a social construct, it doesn't really exist outside of people's heads. A lot of people end up taking this categorization to extremes in both sides, there's plenty of LGBT people that will bully others because they don't fit their definition of gender (luckily a minority, but still). If you are online long enough I bet you've found someone telling you you "are not gay enough" or "you are not truly trans".
And I ask, does all this really matter? Do we really need to adapt to strict definitions for an identity that itself is fluid and moves in a spectrum? Why can't just take people for what they are: people. Everyone is unique and different, and the way they express themselves is what makes them unique. So the ethical thing to do is to respect how they want to be seen as and not bother about how they dress, act or whatever they have in their pants. If you don't like what they do that's also fine, not everyone's tastes have to align, you don't have to befriend everyone. But still, it's never us vs them, stop making imaginary barriers trying to separate yourself from others and dehumanize them.
Everyone feels as much as you do, and they are all as scared as you are. The only truly terrible people in the world are the ones who have forgotten or never learned that fact.
I tend to agree. I would rather live in a world where we didn't need labels and we can all just accept each other no matter how complex our individual experiences are. Almost none of the queer people I know use just one label, and new ones keep appearing day by day. For me that's indicative that the framework is wanting. I think we probably need to come to terms with a more open view on all of this, so that we can all just be ourselves without needing to impose a dictionary and pile of buttons on our fellow human beings in every interaction.
That is why we should just assess people's sex and let them express their personalities as they choose.
I think it's because we are all unique and want to express that that there are so many labels. I guess also in some situations it's easier to use one word instead of one or more sentences to explain who you are 🤔 These labels can also help find community, I think, even if they can be very niche
Oh Adam- I miss you Ruining Everything… but this is pretty cool too.
Adam Ruins the Gender Binary
The topic of non-binary and transgender is so damn broad. It makes my head hurt to try and work my brain through it. Hope it goes better for my grandkids.
That's the thing about transgender and non-binary issues isn't it. It IS incredibly broad, because it's a spectrum. It simply cannot be boiled down to choice A or choice B. They were just as many variations as there are people. Please don't take offense by this, but I would rather somebody get a headache while thinking about the vast diversity in the trans and non-binary community. Then everybody in the trans and non-binary community being forced into one box or the other. And fortunately, now that people are actually talking about this in an honest way, it will be easier for your grandkids. It probably already is.
9:24 I feel this same way as an intersex person. I think that sometimes intersex people are used to validate the existence of non-intersex trans people without any genuine interest in and care for our needs. (I am both intersex and trans, so I specify who I see doing this)
The term intersex is an antiquated term we now know is misleading. Some men are born with genetic or congenital variations or disorders. They are still men. Some women are born with genetic or congenital variations. They are still women. We are a binary species. Good luck!
@@benjaminfranklin8412nope not binary.
@@KingZNIN How are offspring created? How are babies made? There is only one way.
@@benjaminfranklin8412why does that matter? What does making babies have to do with the existence of non-binary people, trans people, and intersex people? I'm an intersex person. I cannot have kids...some intersex people can, but I can't. Does that make me less of a person? Does that make my experience any less valid?
@@iansinclair7789 If you don't know how sexual reproduction structures determine the binary sexes of the human species, you need to put down the Baker and puck up the Dawkins. Also, I never implied in anyway that people with differences in sexual development are not people. Of course you are a person. You are human. What I am saying is that you are male or female...because we are a binary species. Now, if nonbinary exclusively referred to people with severe, extreme DSDs, that could be an interesting discussion. Someone told you that you were not male or female. That person was wrong.
Thank you! We’re here. We’re queer. We’ve always been here
Men who identify as trans or calabai have always existed and they have always been men.
Live your life. I stand with, by and for you!
I like that they bring up the whole rigidity thing. Why do we have to categorize ourselves so quickly and permanently?
Is the story of Magnus Hirschfeld and the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft described in this or any other book? As a collection of information about LGBTQ+ and the persecution of trans people from this institute and the fate of people who survived the war and whether any knowledge or doctors got to the West or somehow passed on information about this work.
In Germany, there were statements from the right describing that trans people were not persecuted in the same way as homosexual people because they could "stop being trans" where, according to to my knowledge, no person who went through transition survived the war, is it described in this book or another?
I'm just a nonbinary person. I let people use most of the pronouns on me, if I get ma'am and sir I've got my look right.
When i get "excuse me mmmssssssir?" while i watch them weigh their options, that is super affirming.
@@LawTaranis 😊
Bless you
Sex is binary and it dictates one's gender in the OVERWHELMING majority of cases. Just because there are exceptions to this rule doesn't mean that the rule is incorrect, the same way someone being born with three arms doesn't make the statement that "humans have two arms" any less true.
14:46 - As for the idea of someone wearing a combination of men’s and women’s clothes - it can be very affirming if it is _their_ decision to do so - but an act of blatant oppression if the very same thing is mandated legally by a court - or even socially by society.
I've been watching you casually since the old TruTV show. I think this format works so much better for you. I love how much more leftist and progressive you come across on RUclips. I watched your Free Returns video earlier today and realized that I wasn't subscribed so I took care of that.
Thanks for doing your part to support unions and pull the conversation to the left.
These are things I was always curious about. What I found interesting is the idea of the buckets you talk about and how our bias as a society is controlled by our narratives that we see as an understanding that always was. Too often we think because we see it that way now that we’ve always seen it that way. That and the cross references between gay, lesbian, and trans that is controlled by the wrong people. It’s an othering type of thinking makes us come together as a group to be fearful of the “others”.
Are there Brazilian stories in the book? There are some nice stories here, because of the dual aspect of society here. Accepting and conservative simultaneously, hypocritical and free. Westernized but indigenous, mixed but reactionary. There are many stories, one in particular, is quite common, like Mulan, or Joan DÁrc, a woman warrior dressed as a man. Maria Quitéria. I have no idea if her story was studied on the aspect of gender and her subjective experience. She was always identified as a she in history books
Thomasina is trans history just like colonial history is American history.
If we only we could abolish gender expectations quicker but I know the change will come. No one should have to feel confined to any arbitrary template.
Can't abolish something that never existed to begin with. It's all in the mind, it requires a mindset change.
Hey now, I'm trans and you're going to pry my gender from my cold, dead hands!
Sensational proclamations aside, it's not gender itself that needs to be dropped, it's the stringent expectations that people have for any gender, including but not limited to, experimentation and mixing/matching aspects.
@@lillywho I love your comment. Thank you for putting it so articulately.
@@Pikachu2Ashyou don't have to do anything at all. What most people do shouldn't shame you, if it does that's on you
@@jer280 Do you or do you not agree that gender is a social construct?
BOOST BOOST BOOST!! How is this not blowing up?
Genetics is on the side of trans not the politicians.
Thank you Adam, thank you Kit. 🏳🌈🏳⚧💕
Something isn't wrong because it's new. Something isn't right because it has a long history. Trans people would be just as real if we were a new phenomenon
You should reach out to another amazing non-binary author Alok Viad-Menon!! They’re the author of Beyond the Gender Binary and a public speaker talking about their nonbinary experience and educating others lovingly and compassionately
Dude just drops a Myst reference like it's nothing
Thank You! 🏳⚧⚧
This was extremely cool! As someone who has had a really slippery, elusive grasp on my own gender identity, these types of conversations are really comforting to me.
Interesting take & much-needed show in this day when we NEED more trans & GNC awareness!!! Love to everybody here, cis or trans xxx
Boy, I'm sure this comment section is going to be a well thought out, empathetic, and respectful discourse.
Thank you for this, only just in the opening and I agree!
One of the prongs I use to educate people, when it comes to Transgender, is to make them aware of Language itself. This is because the concept of binary Gender is something found within our language, and limitation of language is something very unique. For it is hard to imagine what is outside of your own language, given how we use language to think!
I should look up that tribe again, in Australia, that has five or so genders.
Thank you, Adam, for having Kit Heyam on the show. I appreciated every sentence of the broadcast, from both of you. I'm not trans or gender-fluid myself, and I've been struggling to gain an understanding since I too was raised with a differing world view, so it was enlightening to listen to the perspectives of Dr. Heyam and even the analytical prompting from your side. I could see myself in your genuine interest in these perspectives.
Well I know what I'm sharing with my family now. Thanks Adam and Dr. Heyam
Uhhhhh, Adam, you a smart dude. I would think you would see the value in STARTING off any valuable discussion of gender with DISTINGUISHING the definitions of sex versus gender. That's a MAJOR component of so much of the arguments. We gotta acknowledge that for a long time, our culture treated the terms sex and gender as synonymous. So, we to develop understanding about how those terms differ.
People who treat sex and gender as the same usually believe they are *only* talking about biological sex, but they are usually *only* talking about their specific social construct of gender. I find historical/anthropoligical analysis most convincing at getting someone to start questioning this- to see just how DIFFERENT from ALL current western views various peoples thought (and think) of sex and gender.
I think it's partly because the medical field doesn't do a good job at this, we use words such as male and female when talking about gender identity just as often as when talking about genitals, personally I'm a big proponent for new terminology that is less biased and ambiguous, but I doubt that's gonna happen lol
@@imacds, you know, it's also just the people over generations in our culture that have been USED TO all of the forms, paperwork, and classes that have used the words as synonyms. As demonstration, even in your comment, you're not defining either of those words. YOU are also not making it clear what the two definitions are.
@@MaryamMaqdisi, are the terms "male" and "female" also biased when we're using them to refer to animals? What is ambiguous about differentiating the form that biologically capable (not only because of genitals) of producing and developing seeds from the form that fertilizes eggs?
I agree with this, a lot of it is just a Linguistics issue. the language evolved and certain groups of people recognized it but others didn't notice the change which makes them confused which can also make them feel angry, (which isn't the same thing as feeling prejudice).
The word gender was split from the word sex when they had been synonymous for most people for decades at least.
What is "gender" supposed to mean now? It needs to be stated and not assume that your only audience is people on your side who already understand.
And to be fair the new definition of gender has a lot to do with traditional pieces of culture tied to biological sex identity expression.
And when you come swinging out the gates saying gender gender gender and not admitting that this is a new definition of the term that specifically means this, its not as helpful as it can be.
Historians could have told you that. 3000 years ago, 1000, 500, 100, and so on cultures and people have been well aware of the non-binary of gender.
People will say "we can't do Y because we've only ever done X throughout all of history." They won't realize that:
1) we haven't only ever done X. In fact, X is often a relatively new development.
And
2) even if we've only ever done X, that doesn't mean that X is the right thing to do. We advance as a society and change. Change can be hard to adapt to sometimes. (As an autistic individual, trust me, I struggle with change!) Still, it can be very important many times and we, as a society, can emerge better for it.
Gender isn't a real concept so sex is a more useful determinant of what one is.
@@benjaminfranklin8412 it's a real concept. Stop being myopic and obtuse mr psuedo-intellectual. Just because you want an outgroup to hate 🤡 we see through you so clearly, it's embarrassing
Your guest was really respectful and mature. Nice topic also.
So glad you covered this topic!
“Even after they are dead it’s important to meet them on their terms” and I think about nex Benedict for example, they have been misgendered multiple times in the media and also referred by his dead name and I find that super disrespectful. this is a pretty insightful video.
Thank you. I'm a Healthcare Professional. Gender is more complex than what biology teaches.
It's particularly interesting to hear about people who normally live as men starting to live as women in an internment camp and then, at least in one case, going back to living as a man and not wanting to recall that time period. It sounds like Dr. Heyam doesn't want to consider the possibility that these experiences were something other than natural self-expression within a highly stressful and abnormal social environment.
Clothing covers up who we are, the less we are seen without it in our community, the more we are defined by it and have to define ourselves with it, manufacturing gender identities and roles in societies which we may or may not conform too, instead of us just being people.
I'm 50, lost a lot of weight, and somebody has to REALLY care about me as a person to find my nekkid body enjoyable.
...JUST SAYING.
I don't have enough loose skin to glide down off the top of tall buildings like a flying squirrel, but...still pretty flappy.
...
...NGL, that would be awesome if I did.
@@grmpEqweerno one meets societies expectations of perfect, we can work on our own ideas of perfection, wrinkles and all.
As much as I try to be an ally, I am trying to wrap my brain around whether it is necessary for all these labels. Are we just labeling our own personalities and how much of our personalities are trauma-based? Do these labels really matter for people to function in society?
The labels make it easier to talk about something. It's hard to educate people about something if you can't name the thing.
Yes these labels really do matter for people to function in society.
Native Americans also recognized trans.
Lots of fascinating accounts of this across tribes. Shows how a community that watches its children grow up together recognize those differences and find ways to integrate based on knowing and loving someone from birth. Our disconnection and individualism is a big piece of our modern bigotry and failure to embrace like cultures of the past.
“native americans” arent one group, they are many peoples, who most of them *did not* recognize trans people; even if trans people existed. Saying this has roots to the “Noble Savage” Myth saying that the “savages” did things better; like gender and climate change.
Indigenous tribes never claimed men could become women.
You started this by presenting your own ideas as the absolute conclusion. Hardly the best basis for an open and honest discussion.
THIS WAS SUCH A BRILLIANT INTERVIEW!!
This was really fascinating and insightful, I deeply appreciate Dr. Heyam's nuanced explorations of gender concepts. I was especially struck by your discussion of the Isle of Man internment camp and I have a story to tell about that, though it has nothing to do with what you talked about here but it might be of interest anyways. Apparently, the man my siblings and I knew as our Uncle Willy, my German-American mother's godfather, was interned there. He was a captain of a German merchant ship during and after WWI and it seems his ship was seized by the British and the crew put in the Man camp. In Germany he was an amateur boxer and so in the camp the British allowed prisoners to have sports teams and such, so Willy continued as a boxer in bouts put on for the prisoners' entertainment. My brother found, in our mother's RIP boxes of old letters and stuff, an antique postcard of good ol' Willy in boxing regalia posing. The postcard was published in Britain at the time, it seems as a kind of "yes we've got this internment camp but we treat them well and they go about their lives kind of as normal." So a bit of propaganda like. After the War Willy was released, went back to Germany, resumed his captaincy and our Opa was a sailor on his ship. They docked in NYC around 1921 and our Opa jumped ship and lived in Queens NY, eventually marrying our Omi, also from Germany, and had our mother. One day after several years in Queens Opa walked down the street and bumped into none other than Willy who had been living right around the corner for quite a while himself! So that's how he became my mother's godfather. Later he built the house in south state NY that we moved into after he and his wife died in the early 70s. Rather, Willy died in 1956 after being hit by a car and he left the hospital prematurely and collapsed in his home one day. His wife, our Tante Anna, lived there alone until 1973. But that all is another story. Anyways, we now know what happened to at least one of those prisoners.
Something worth noting is that people with ADHD have always identified at a greater rate than the general population (used to be 10 times greater lol). And its a scientific study, in case you run into the "facts dont care about your feelings" type.
Same goes for autistic people. Sadly, if those people get confronted with these facts they're usually not going to think that this is a good point. Instead they will jump to: "We need to save children with ADHD and autism from 'indoctrination'."
You got the study? you cant just say facts over feelings without actually proving the facts. Also scientific studies can be biased or misinterpreted hence why its important to provide references. So reference please
@@SaviourInDistresseasily google-able. It's 6.64 times more likely (to have gender variations) for ADHD folks though as of the 2018 study I found, not 10x more likely. One study is cited in the National Library of Medicine at NIH.gov.
In Poland when a woman took the throne she was called King Jadwiga, only becoming Queen Jadwiga after marrying king of Lithuania, because in Poland "queen" is defined solely as "king's wife"
there used to be a Sex worker in england who live their life sometimes as a man and sometimes as a woman. how we know this is because they were arrested several times for prostitution.
Dr. Heyam's book is fabulous. I loved how in depth the whole thing was.
Thanks for this interview, and for bringing attention to our community in a positive way
If switching sex (or making a sex to suit a gender) was an inherent feature of humans or something we could always do, wouldn't we know by now?
Well yeah, we know now, even if the nazis burned the sexology library, even if society/school keeps telling a false version of history, we still remember and we know we always existed
Gender defines your role in society and expectations around how you dress and behave and are treated. Historically our society has two roles, a binary. Male citizen and those who aren't. But these were further subdivided, eg by age, relationship status, skin and hair colour and class.
The etymology of gender is type or kind.
How you were defined under societies rules, limited who you were and weren't meant to have relationships with and the nature of those relationships, including expressions of sexuality.
Times change, adult females have suffrage and are moving to equality. Race, religion, citizenship, language, ability and class are no longer meant to be limits, but there are still many areas where holdovers from the past come into play.
Society still has three predominate gender roles, female, male, and child. These still engender strong expectations and limits on behaviour, but they are not the only ones.
They are roles taught by society, through toys, media, tools and dress. By what behaviors are acknowledged, tolerated, seen, endorsed and discouraged.
Kindergarten's for instance just have an adult bathroom and a children's bathroom, two gender roles. Primary schools however divide bathrooms into 3 to 6 types or genders (junior, senior, adult, etc.)
But when you shift from everyone as equal treated equitably, to classifying and limiting people by type, there will always be those who are hard to place, people who are beyond the rules created and used society that define type ie transgender.
When for instance does a child transition to an adult, is it 16, 18, 21, when they can drive, vote, drink, serve, leave school, work, be a chess grandmaster? What about when they can reproduce? But what if a person is sterile or infertile or matures at a different pace or differently to the most common outcomes?
While most will mostly fit, some won't. Sime will be gender fluid, transitioning between types, others will be gender non defined, other won't conform physically or behaviorally to the expectations of their gender and be gender non conforming. For some affirming their gender to help them better conform to societies expectations may involve dressing differently or even include surgery to their face and bodies.
We've always had more than two ways we define and limit people by type, and we've always had people who don't neatly fit in the boxes of race, class, age, sex etc. How we define people has always changed as the needs and opportunities of society has changed. That change is a gradual process. We define our society. Who is kept safely in our possession and who feels safe to express who they are. Who feels safe to defend themselves and who feels they must be defended to feel safe.
@@chuckles9767 gender simply means type. You agree child is a societal role, what specifically do you disagree with?
Children dress differently, have different expectations of behaviour and how they are treated. Part of that is considering them non-sexual, asexual, innocent and taboo. Do you see their gender or type as transgender perhaps, that is outside the two common adult types that define relationship behaviours and limits when class, religion and race are removed?
@@chuckles9767 Gender refers to the social and cultural identity, a child isn't a man or a woman. If not a man or a woman they must be something else, hence a third gender child.
You might argue they're a male or female child, but how do you define that, external physical features hidden by clothes (that can change over time), chromosomes, activation of genes on those chromosomes, brain construction. Socially and culturally those aren't on display. Hence why being, neither man or woman, child exists as a construct to describe an identity.
It also shows how people can transition from one identity to another and even be in-between.
When people say "there are more trans people today than in the past," I've always used left handedness analogy.
For a period of time in the past, being left handed was seen as a horrible thing. Kids writing with their left hands were beaten until they used "the correct hand." So there were few people who openly said that they were lefties.
Then, attitudes towards lefties softened. People were allowed to write with whichever hand they preferred. The number of lefties rose sharply.
Was this some "left-handed woke mind virus turning the kids into lefties?" No. It was just lefties expressing who they were instead of saying that they were right-handed to avoid beatings. At a certain point, the left handed boom leveled out and remained constant.
The same is true of trans people. They were always there, but were forced to hide who they really were for fear of violence (or, at best, ostracization). When we started accepting them for who they were, trans people were able to openly declare who they are and we had a "trans boom." If we continue to accept trans people, this "trans boom" would level off like the left handed "boom" did. It will reach a level that it was actually at all along, instead of being kept artificially low with threats of violence.
Men who identify as trans or calabai have always existed and they have always been men.
Is the number of lefthanded people increasing with each generation? Are some parents trying to convince their righthanded children that they’re actually lefthanded?