Answers to frequently asked questions in the comments: (Note: As Butler says, there are many perspectives on gender. This is not intended to be an authoritative answer. There is room to argue, to learn, to disagree. Hopefully this answers some general questions we often see in the comments and helps the conversation move forward.) Aren't men and women physically different? What's the difference between biological sex and gender? What does 'assigned at birth' mean? As Butler acknowledges at 1:41, there are biological differences in sex. To clarify: Most people are born with the sex of either male (with XY chromosomes and male anatomy) or female (with XX chromosome and female anatomy). A small proportion of people are born with different chromosomal or anatomical makeups (e.g. Klinefelter syndrome). Gender is the role people of a specific sex play in different cultures. For example: In 15th century Italy, men wore tights and skirts, while in 21st century America that would be considered feminine. In 1950s America, most women would not have careers, while in 2023 Haredi culture, most men do not work and most women do. All of these people have similar biology, but the norms around how they live: their dress, their occupation, their manners and customs, etc. can be very different based on their sex and the society. The phrase 'assigned at birth' refers to how most of us are raised from birth with the gender role most typical of the sex you are born. (This is often true even of people who are neither biologically male or female). Transgender people are those who intuitively identify with a different gender from their sex or assigned gender, and decide to live as it. Nonbinary people are those who identify with neither gender, and decide to stop publicly identifying with them. Why don't we just expand the definitions of gender to include more behaviors, rather than people having to switch genders? It's possible to do both. People frequently identify as their assigned gender despite having some unconventional behaviors for it. Others simply feel a deeper connection to the gender they weren't raised as, and feel happier living as it. Butler argues that we should simply allow people to define themselves how they like and respect that choice. Why wasn't anyone doing this until recently? There are well-documented examples of transgender and non-binary people for hundreds, if not thousands of years: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_history There are also many examples of people redefining gender over the course of history; indeed, that may be how we got from 15th century gender roles to today's. In recent memory, artists like David Bowie, Prince, Eddie Izzard--as well as movies like Boys Don't Cry, Priscilla Queen of the Desert, and Tootsie--are all famous examples of exploring different gender identities. It seems reasonable to acknowledge humans have had a wide variety of feelings and behavior around gender. It's also worth noting that in many societies defying gender roles could--and can--come with severe social or even criminal consequences, and that likely reduced the amount of behaviors people expressed. As greater knowledge and acceptance of nonconventional identities emerges, it's possible that more people simply feel comfortable identifying and expressing feelings that might have been repressed in the past. For a deeper dive into the scientific research around transgender issues, check out our columnist Ethan Seigel's recent article on it: bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/what-is-a-woman/
When my Brother at 11 years of age was lured by a pack of pedophiles .Ultimately groomed, used ,then basically slaughtered ! Also tried to explain gender abnormalities ! Why they are being shoved down our throats is to keep on destroying the normal balanced Families Which develop healthy communities and Culture . Divide and conquer . So the psychopath Elite can ?
I respect personality and individual identity. What I have a problem with is the gender theorist claim that a great many behaviours are incompatible with a biological sex (of which there are only two. There is no third mechanism by which reproduction may occur in humans, nor can humans switch between the two). What the majority of people think about typical behaviours associated with certain sexes is irrelevant and it is the height of narcissism to define your personal identity around what other people think - so far as to claim, you may have been born into the wrong body because of what other people think of your body. Of course people have always behaved differently. But it is an entirely new phenomenon for activists to claim that mere behaviour has changed their physiology, entitling them to access to the protected spaces of the opposite sex.
"As Butler says, there are many perspectives on gender." And all of those stemming from modern gender theory (e.g., transgenderism) are incoherent. "As Butler acknowledges at 1:41, there are biological differences in sex." And in age groups. Hence, we not only have terms to distinguish between sexes (male and female) but also terms to distinguish between age groups (child and adult). For efficiency's sake, we call an adult human female a woman, a human child that's female a girl, adult human males men, and human children that are male boys. "To clarify: Most people are born with the sex of either male (with XY chromosomes and male anatomy) or female (with XX chromosome and female anatomy). A small proportion of people are born with different chromosomal or anatomical makeups (e.g. Klinefelter syndrome)." And those people are also either males or females, because your chromosomal makeup is not what actually makes you one or the other gender. "Gender is the role people of a specific sex play in different cultures." Nonsense. You are confusing gender itself with gender roles and norms. But if we were to equate them, it wouldn't be workable with the rest of your worldview. After all, if someone were to adhere to the roles/norms expected of men but identify as a woman, what would you call them? "The phrase 'assigned at birth' refers to how most of us are raised from birth with the gender role most typical of the sex you are born." No. Doctors *observe* our gender (aka sex) and simply report it. Even in those extremely rare cases in which our external genitalia mislead them on our gender, the truth is still found by taking a deeper look at our biology. "Transgender people are those who intuitively identify with a different gender from their sex or assigned gender, and decide to live as it." First problem: We can't possibly know what we "intuitively" identify with, because we've no basis for that comparison. We've all only been just the one gender, so we'd have no way of knowing the difference between "feeling like" a man vs. "feeling like" a woman, or indeed if there is such a difference to begin with. Second problem: What is meant by "decide to live as (a gender)"? Again, you seem to be confusing gender roles/norms with gender itself. But someone who adheres to all of the gender roles and norms of a man but doesn't identify as one wouldn't be considered one even by you. "There are well-documented examples of transgender and non-binary people for hundreds, if not thousands of years" Which doesn't explain the recent apparent uptick in its popularity. And if the narrative that not going along with their self-identification causes them to unalive themselves, it becomes inexplicable why there wasn't a huge amount in self-unalivings throughout history, as people were inarguably far less tolerant of this nonsense than they are today. "For a deeper dive into the scientific research around transgender issues, check out our columnist Ethan Seigel's recent article..." Let's not pretend that actual science can back this worldview. Science is about objective, observable reality. Transgenderism can't even produce objective, workable definitions for its terms. And neither can any of the so-called "scientists" giving the worldview lip service.
As a trans woman, I would've hoped that Judith would've been more specific and mentioned gender role, gender expression and gender identity rather than just lump the 3 all together under the umbrella term of gender. This is because 2 of those (gender role and expression) are social constructs, and gender identity is as biological as our genetic sex. Our gender identity is hard-wired into our brains during the 2nd trimester of gestation through exposure to differing amounts of androgens, but because people are lazy, identity gets lumped in with role and expression and is classed as a construct. This gives anti-trans bigots the opportunity to dismiss my identity as just a choice when it is not. It doesn't make sense to think it is. Who would risk losing family and friends, getting beaten up or worse, and being discriminated against by the state if they had a choice in the matter?
As a feminist in the early 1970s, I was harshly criticized for wanting to be a wife and mother. I was called a traitor to the cause for not disparaging that 'toxic' role. I was shocked! Because to me, the point was to have a society where everyone is valued and free to pursue WHATEVER vocation you feel called to! The idea that women could ONLY be 'equal' if they do what men do is giving up on feminism.
Doubtful, especially since 'toxic' definitions weren't part of the vocabulary until the late 2000s. That's also just not the philosophy of modern feminism as it didn't matter if you got married, so long as it was a consensual setup where you weren't coerced into being homebound.
@@rickperez8975 Project much? No one cares about people minding their own business, it's when reactionaries do all they can to f*** with vulnerable groups that aren't in any way affecting them.
What I always find interesting is for a lot of binary trans people (let’s take a transwoman for my example) they’ll often experience some of their life before they fully work themselves out in which they’ll constantly be told “you’re not a real man,” for all their feminine habits and features and interests etc. and then the moment that person goes “no actually, you’re right, I’m not a man, I’m a woman” suddenly the attack switches to “you’re not a real woman”
BD, you don't have to be anywhere near trans to hear those insults. Just be a tomboy. Just be a boy who would rather practice violin than play baseball. This is all a distraction to avoid people seeing the money leave their possession to find its way into the billionaires offshore accounts, and maybe a way to appease the crueler evangelical sects.
As a feminine gay man, this was always the case. I was made fun of for beeing too girly, but if a trans woman states her identity, then no matter how feminine she is, she is "a man". People don't care about "natural order", "biology" or "reality", they only care to excercise their control over others.
TRUE! You are absolutely right! So are others! Notice what you wrote about transwomen's experience of being told "you’re not a real man". We know exactly what this means. However, this statement --- “you’re not a real man” --- is not the same as that "you are a woman" nor that "you are a real woman" nor does it imply so. However, the very moment that the person goes “no actually, you’re right, I’m not a man, I’m a woman”, at that instant the person is wrong! No, that person is still a man, but not a 'real' man, in the sense of being a manly man, macho man, or an otherwise a normal man (as difficult as it may be to define "normal" for the purposes of the current context). And it is absolutely correct that such a person should be told “you’re not a real woman” as well as “you’re not a woman at all in any sense of the word WOMAN”. Individuals, no matter what their preferences and behavior, should be free to live life according to their own choices for maximum happiness. Everyone's rights must be protected and advanced no matter who that person is and how he/she behaves (without impinging on others' rights, etc.).
@@fraiopatll633 So you're saying they're not a "real" man or woman? What a ridiculous notion. You can't have your cake and eat it too. The person is a "real" whatever the hell they want to be, in that "man" and "woman" do not have unambiguous definitions. I'm a man that usually does not exhibit "macho" behaviour, in fact I find it pretty stupid. I'm still a real man. "Man" and "woman" as they pertain to how we fit into society have nothing to do with what genitals you have or how masculine/feminine your look or behave. Everyone is what they feel they are, and they are a real one of whatever that is. I suggest you watch the video again, seems like it went completely over your head.
What I love even more about Butler's performativity theory is that it cannot only be applied to gender, but also to basically every other subject position. Every group you're part of, be it an ethnicity or even a fandom of some random movie, brings its own stereotypical set of behaviours that is repeated and reinforced all the time. Makes it a very interesting tool for analysis in anthropological research
@@Open-6As someone with mental illness, I'd say yes, to an extent. There are certainly ways in which we feel people with mental illness are stereotypically "supposed" to act and think about themselves, and these ideas can shape our behavior. To be clear, "performative" doesn't mean something isn't real, just that there's a performative element to it, a way in which we've been socially taught to behave.
@@theprousteffect9717 separating "performative" from "worthless" or "not real" was a super important step in understanding how i interact with fashion and personal expression!! for a while i was pretty frustrated that a decent chunk of my interest in those areas was driven by approval & acknowledgement from others w/ similar design philosophies as opposed to being generated intrinsically-took me a long time to realize that the entire world of experimental fashion is built around performance, trading style that most people connect with at a base level with a more intimate connection with much fewer. it gave me a lot of peace with how i share my gender with others & what i hope to gain from it
these identities are unfortunately held over us and used to oppress, these form constructs and cages, but we can find liberation through breaking the constraints and fighting patriarchy and capitalism.
@@MonkeyDLuffy-gd6se Right, as a black person in the US, I'll just not focus on it. I'm sure it's just because I'm thinking about it, nothing to do with how other people treat me, every day. Like, are you serious?
Well you'll have to be quick as there's a ton of deletions already!!! Reasonable comments I might add but obviously not woke enough so auto-delete is in effect!!!
Simone de Beauvoir never said that the body is not a fact. By "becoming a woman", she meant that the cultural and social expectations to which a woman is subjected shape the way she thinks, behaves, acts and sees herself. Beauvoir never denied the physical fact that a woman is an adult female human being. Feminism was about "gender roles", not about gender as something inherent in every human being from birth or even before. She wanted to show the exact opposite of such an essentialist image of women and men.
Judith Butler says that parental incest against children is sometimes not a violation. This is “queer theory.” Hat tip to Derrick Jensen for compiling the quotes from Butler (and for his commentary in between the Butler quotes). Here are Butler’s words “queersplaining” why parents raping children is sometimes okay: In her 2004 book Undoing Gender, she wrote, “It is not necessary to figure parent-child incest as a unilateral impingement on the child by the parent, since whatever impingement takes place will also be registered within the sphere of fantasy. In fact, to understand the violation that incest can be--and also to distinguish between those occasions of incest that are violation and those that are not--it is unnecessary to figure the body of the child exclusively as a surface imposed upon from the outside.”[1] So here she is arguing that sometimes parent-child incest is not a violation. She also wrote, “The reification of the child’s body as passive surface would thus constitute, at a theoretical level, a further deprivation of the child: the deprivation of psychic life.”[2] This is the same old pro-pedo argument we’ve seen so many times already: if you perceive children who are being fucked/raped by adults as the victims of sexual abuse then you are oppressing and objectifying the child. And she wrote, “So I keep adding this qualification: ‘when incest is a violation,’ suggesting that I think that there may be occasions in which it is not. Why would I talk that way? Well, I do think that there are probably forms of incest that are not necessarily traumatic or which gain their traumatic character by virtue of the consciousness of social shame that they produce.”[3] And there we go again, with the same old pro-pedo notion that it’s not the child rape that is harmful: it’s the social stigma that is harmful. And to bring it all home, she suggests, along with the other pro-pedo queer theorists and anarchists, that prohibiting parent/child incest is in itself harmful: “It might, then, be necessary to rethink the prohibition on incest as that which sometimes protects against a violation, and sometimes becomes the very instrument of a violation.”[4]
@@Memebrain777 your boy Derrick doesn't understand Judith Butler. I know that you didn't begin feeling angry about Judith Butler's theories because you were doing reading about incest, so what is your actual problem, and why have you decided to crusade against her with this nonsense?
@@Memebrain777So, Queer theory is when.. No querness is involved? Instead, Queer theory is um, let's see... child abuse? Actual brainrot of an argument.
The more I try to understand what gender is, the less I understand what it is and what its utility is supposed to be (and this video did not help bring any answers). I've always been a boy with a feminine temperament and mannerism and am still averse to everything typically male (TV sports, cars, competition, etc.) so I've felt like it was hard for me to fit in during my teens and early adulthood, partly because most people mistake me as being gay but mostly because I had some idea of a mold that I didn't fit in. At some point, I've come to realize that it was not society that held expectations from me but only myself and by completely rejecting the concept of gender, I was finally able to be at ease with who I am because I don't feel the need to define myself or to fit into a mold anymore. That's why I think that the gender discussion is headed in the wrong direction, we should completely get rid of the concept instead of creating an infinite number of categories that do not mean much anyway. Sex affects our biology, so it's relevant but gender is meaningless and an endless source of confusion.
I agree with you on gender abolition, but there are many people for whom gender is important and meaningful. I suppose the best path forward here, then, is to allow gender to become split up into more and more sublabels until the meaning and need for such labels becomes obsolete. All this, while at the same time rectifying the gender inequality currently present in our systems. Regardless, I think the most important part is not to understand gender identity and all the ins and outs of gender theory, but to go into the world with an open mind and respect for others.
I wonder if Gender is actually such a thing, or, if the goal is that each of us can be whatever we want to be, Gender becomes a pointless distinction, and at the end the only thing that's left is just biological sex not assigned to social behavior expectations and standards.
@@NorthernRealmJackal They are both a set of methods derived from analysis of reactionary movements. Critical Theory has its origins in analyzing Nazism, which in turn was a reactionary movement against Weimar liberalism. It wasn't the critical theorists who labeled, it was the Nazis who labeled. The critical theorists just tried to find out why and on which grounds the Nazis labeled and then started to deconstruct those labels. Which is why critical theorists still play a major role in Nazi conspiracy theories to this day. Intersectionality is the method of working out shared goals between oppressed groups. It's the result of recognizing that oppressions often works systemically and these systems affect several oppressed groups at once. Gender might indeed become a "pointless distinction" once liberal ideals are fully realized, because in a sense the label only became necessary because oppressed groups were attacked for freely expressing their identity. These attacks lead to the naming of the things that are being attacked. Hannah Arendt once said that if you are being attacked as a Jew you have to defend yourself as a Jew, not as a Citizen of the World or with reference to human rights. The freedom liberalism promised means we get to make up the way we live, the things we come up with are not real until we make them.
I think part of the point is, and what separates gender theory from individualism, is that when it comes to gender, you can't simply choose who you are. Yes, to some extent we have free will, but we are also created and limited by the social forces that have made us. When it comes to gender, we don't simply choose to be a man or a woman, or trans, or non-binary, we are formed by the social norms of our society. Most people conform to those norms. But where the is power there is always resistance. Where there are rules, there are always exceptions. Where there are norms, there are always things that subvert those norms. It's not entirely understood how or why people become trans, but what is clear is that they have little choice in the matter. Sometime, for some reason, a person's sense of self attaches to what society tells us the opposite of what they should be. Other times, it subverts society's binary rules completely. Gender does not exist an any objective, material way, but it is certainly real in so far as it constrains and informs how we live our lives, how we think of ourselves, and how we feel and desire.
@@themovingkitchen5238 The same is true for individualism. Prior to the industrial revolution people lived in tighter communities and needed to repress their individualism in order to protect the integrity of the group. With industrialization people moved to cities, had more privacy and somewhat anonymous relationships with the people around them, which allowed for more individual expression without threatening the integrity of social fabric. If you ask me, gender is just what happens when you have several generations of liberally socialized people who grew up reproducing pre-liberal social norms less and less with each generation. We're now around 2-4 generations into that and people start questioning sexual and gender norms. It is the most obvious development ever. Nobody should be scared by it.
@@themovingkitchen5238 I understand the argument, but the more I think about it, the more it sounds like astrology and religion. Anyways, I'm happy to live in a society where people can freely be what they want to be.
Humans are intensely tribalistic and driven by the need to survive. Our beliefs are part of our survival so when someone challenges our beliefs, they challenge our survival. Thats why we react emotionally to new ideas. Reason and rationale is reserved for the familiar.
I LOVE that Big Think never gives a platform to someone who yells their viewpoint at us and says that anyone that disagrees with them is evil and wrong. They're always measured and rational adults who understand their own viewpoint AS WELL AS THE VIEWPOINT OF THE OTHER SIDE of the issue they're discussing. It brings perspective and understanding to issues I have yet to find in other channels.
So? This video explicitly puts you in the bag of the mass murdering SS if you don't accept her drivel. Multiple times she calls arguments against her stupid ideas an attack. Castrating and slaughtering the gullible victims of the plastic genitals industry for profit is called freedom by her. Questioning that is called an attack on democracy by her. How can someone be more malicious?
Judith Butler says that parental incest against children is sometimes not a violation. This is “queer theory.” Hat tip to Derrick Jensen for compiling the quotes from Butler (and for his commentary in between the Butler quotes). Here are Butler’s words “queersplaining” why parents raping children is sometimes okay: In her 2004 book Undoing Gender, she wrote, “It is not necessary to figure parent-child incest as a unilateral impingement on the child by the parent, since whatever impingement takes place will also be registered within the sphere of fantasy. In fact, to understand the violation that incest can be--and also to distinguish between those occasions of incest that are violation and those that are not--it is unnecessary to figure the body of the child exclusively as a surface imposed upon from the outside.”[1] So here she is arguing that sometimes parent-child incest is not a violation. She also wrote, “The reification of the child’s body as passive surface would thus constitute, at a theoretical level, a further deprivation of the child: the deprivation of psychic life.”[2] This is the same old pro-pedo argument we’ve seen so many times already: if you perceive children who are being fucked/raped by adults as the victims of sexual abuse then you are oppressing and objectifying the child. And she wrote, “So I keep adding this qualification: ‘when incest is a violation,’ suggesting that I think that there may be occasions in which it is not. Why would I talk that way? Well, I do think that there are probably forms of incest that are not necessarily traumatic or which gain their traumatic character by virtue of the consciousness of social shame that they produce.”[3] And there we go again, with the same old pro-pedo notion that it’s not the child rape that is harmful: it’s the social stigma that is harmful. And to bring it all home, she suggests, along with the other pro-pedo queer theorists and anarchists, that prohibiting parent/child incest is in itself harmful: “It might, then, be necessary to rethink the prohibition on incest as that which sometimes protects against a violation, and sometimes becomes the very instrument of a violation.”[4]
Big Think is also Woke and forces female representation in their videos in spite of the scientific fact that females are substantially outnumbered by Males in high IQ occupations for purely genetic reasons, meaning that it is appropriate for Males to continue outbumbering Females as science communicators and that their agenda is ridiculous.
By challenge you mean 1. The same thing I've heard and already explained a million times like some kind of tour guide simply because people expect a explanation for my existence instead of just letting me live, and these aren't simple short topics, it's like giving a whole lecture 2. Really dumb stuff, like extremely dumb stuff, religious bullshit I don't believe in and that should have nothing to do with me, people who don't believe in individual liberty (even though they might claim to be fans). 3. Asking inappropriate questions about my genitals and how I have sex. There's a certain point you just need to mind your own business and let people live and practice their own individual liberty, you know?
@@No-ky3kbI'm a gay atheist and a socialist, and I don't believe in gender. Gender cannot be observed or measured objectively (that's why we're told to ask for pronouns), therefore it is an unproven hypothesis. Butler manipulates and distorts almost everything in her video and she never references any science throughout. Her manipulations and lies have inspired terrible confusion in LGB children, she has given license for males to invade lesbian spaces, she is a lazy philosopher, a fraud, and the imo the worst L to have ever lived. Shame on her for all of the hurt and pain her lies have caused LGB people.
The more I learn about it the more gender just sounds like a fancy way of saying sex stereotypes. Doesn’t sound like a legitimate concept at all and more like something offensive and oppressive even. I figure let’s drop the concept and stereotypes and just let people be whoever they want to be just as they are.
You're exactly right and radical feminist critics of Butler agree with you. Gender ideology is based in stereotypes and homophobia. It says that if a boy wants to wear dresses and play with dolls that he must be trans, based on the sex stereotypes of our culture. Effeminate boys often grow up to be gay, or they're just effeminate and that's ok. And there are tomboys. In the real world, we know that most men and women aren't GI Joes and Barbie dolls but have a wide range of interests and presentations. You're a man because you're an adult male or a woman because you're an adult female. That's it. Everything else (wearing makeup, shooting guns) is your personality, interest, hobby, etc. that we may or may not associate with masculine or feminine traits in any given culture.
Yeaaa mannn let’s just let go of social norms and allow potentially predatory and mentally unstable biological men into women only bathrooms, sports and spaces. Live and let live ✌️
Yes, Gender theory is and will continue to just confuse the hell out of kids, as they think they need to choose a gender. People have personalities that make them like certain things, period, and that is allowed and should be accepted in todays world. But the current state is that trans people arient being told they are accepted for who they are, which is different from who gender ideologists are telling them what sex or gender they could be.
This is how most 'nonbinary' people probably feel. I myself think we should abolish the idea of 'people being more similar to one another than different'
If gender is a social construct then why should I adhere to it? If I want to disregard "gender" and instead only use biological sex why can't I do that?
Social construct means that it's a construct society imposes upon you. You personally might decide to disregard it, but others will still have an idea of what 'gender' you are.
@@torginus Just because the society imposes a social construct doesn't determine whether or not that social construct is valid or correct. I deem it invalid and arbitrary. You can impose it all you want, but myself and the majority of the population refuse to adhere to it.
Without Simone de Beauvoir here to explain her own views, we need to be clear that Butler is presenting Butler’s own interpretation of de Beauvoir’s writings - and that that interpretation is contested and criticised by other philosophers.
Simone de Beauvoir is from mid 20th century. The scientific study of sexuality advanced a lot in these last decades, but Butler ignores it, and thinks she can take ideas about sexuality out of her head (and the heads of other armchair philosophers who also ignore scientific research).
5:16 the most misinterpreted sentence "one is not born a woman, but rather becomes one" basically means the exact opposite this woman is claiming. De Beauvoir is talking about 'the concept/idea' of a woman as a role in society, not an actual woman (an adult human female). The meaning is that the concept 'woman' is accomplished when females play the role society wants them to: wife, mother, beautiful, carer, passive... That's what de Beauvoir is criticising, not affirming. The book is called "the second S EX" for a reason 🤦🏻♀️ because it's about the oppression women suffer because of their s ex, not their gender identity or other made up things. I'm just leaving the comment in case anyone is interested.
@@4651adri Beauvoir never equated "woman" with just "adult human female". She instead spent 800 or so pages exploring the question of "who is woman, and why is she the other?", and used "woman" and "feminine" often interchangeably - which, to be fair, has also to do with the French language. AND she was a major existentialist, while gender transition - defining oneself to live authentically - is pretty much the most existentialist thing one can do.
Sadly i'm not sure how much longer humanity has on this planet... if we keep yelling at each other over this type of crap (instead of just letting people live their lives and also not trying to force people to be respectful) ... all we have left is our own self to worry about
Sex is not assigned at birth; you are born with it, the same way you are born with your eye color, hair color, legs, arms, etc. Therefore, gender has a direct association with biological characteristics, just like people born with light yellow hair are called blond, and people over 1.80m height are called tall, etc. People born with female sex organs are called women, and people with male sex organs are called men. This doesn't mean that there aren't men who identify as women or women who identify as men, but this is an identity issue. For example, if someone with blond hair dyes their hair to become a brunette, they can believe to be and perceive themselves as a brunette, but in reality, in biology, they are blond.
Have you verified someone's original hair colour before processing the fact of the hair colour you see? If you don't check their original biological hair colour before thinking of them as blonde or brunette or whatever, then you are judging them off their appearance. Thatms the point, gender is a societal performance.
@@spectremodtrain5936 "Have you verified someone's original hair colour before processing the fact of the hair colour you see?" Yes, it's an objective hair colour, there is no judgement involved, it is a fact, it can be checked with a Colorimeter. The color of the hair is not a social construct, it is objective, it has to do with how light reflects off the hair. We humans assign a name to that "reflection". Gender is not a social construct either, sex and gender are tied to biology. This can be checked with a DNA test. It is totally independent of how people perceive themselves.
@@oresteluci My question is whether you personally use a colorimeter on people's heads when you meet them, and when you classify their image and deploy it into your consciousness. The answer is most likely no. It would be unnecessary and totally anal to do so. Scientifically you don't classify people by measuring wavelengths and objective facts - you know i have a face because you feel I have two eyes, a nose and a mouth. In the end the societal performance of hair colour is the part we should deal with, evidently, if discussing social issues. If a person got drunk and began giving money to any blonde person they saw on their street the most important matter would be the people performing this blondeness. When it comes to gender you are this same drunk person even sober. You assign and behave and communicate socially according to the societal performanc ethat is gender whether you object to how unscientific it is or not.
@@spectremodtrain5936 We are talking about different things: perceptions versus reality. People can be perceived and interpreted in as many ways as there are humans; however, this doesn't alter the fact of reality. I do not know if a person is naturally blond or not when I see them, but that doesn't take away the fact of their real natural hair colour. A woman can dress as a man, act as a man, have surgery, and be indistinguishable from a man at first glance. But in biology, they have a woman's DNA, and this cannot be changed. That's why we have a special classification for them; "Transgender". We need a term to differentiate them from biological men and women. Otherwise, why would we need such a terminology? Don't get me wrong; I have nothing against transgender people. People can do whatever they want and perceive themselves however they wish if it makes them happy. What I don't agree with is forcing the ideology that gender is a social construct because it is not, it is based on biology.
That is actually a great question. "Becoming" is a very philosophical verb about the nature of nature itself... She's specifically referring to simone's philosophy around the early conception of the difference between the biological objectivity of the body and the aocial construction around and about that object
@@imiguifurr Quit conflating gender/sex with personality traits and temperament and gender roles, as though they're synonymous. They're Not. All men are born male, all females are born female and there are exactly ZERO exceptions. Neither are social constructs, feelings, fetishes or costumes. Your DNA literally organizes your physical body. DNA dictates the production of objective biological differences between males and females. 100% of the population is either male or female, even intersex people. If they have a Y chromosome, they are heterogametic and male. If not, they are homogametic and female. But you knew that because you've actually educated yourself on these conditions, right? Personality traits and temperament (Neither of which is gender exclusive -- hence effeminate males, butch females and tomboys), aren't synonymous with gender or gender roles. There is no internal feeling that is exclusive to men or women (or boys/girls), what makes anyone a man or a woman is being either male or female and reaching adulthood. Their sex and stage of physical maturity makes them men or women, not some "feeling" they have. Believing there is some "essence" specific to males or female as far as feelings go, that can manifest "in the wrong body", is akin to a religious belief, having faith in something that is impossible to prove or disprove. The thing is though, that no one on the "trans" side can actually even explain what this "essence" is, they can't even explain it to themselves yet have convinced themselves that the feeling they have means they "are in the wrong body" - without realizing that their discomfort simply stems from not realizing that they view conforming to sexist stereotypes as legitimate measures of manhood or womanhood. That is why every explanation given of WHY a male "can't be a man, but is instead woman" etc. relies upon listing stereotypical stuff, or, in some cases is completely abstract and refuses to actually provide any explanation of what they mean, simply stating they "know" that what they feel means what they say it does, even though they can't actually provide a definition of it. "It's hard to explain but I know I'm right" is an attitude one constantly comes up against - a religious faith in something they can't define. This idea that the terms "man" and "woman" carry all this baggage, sexist stereotypes, that people need to live up to or feel comfortable with is a complete fabrication coming from the "trans" side. You lot want a term to reflect aspects of your personality as well, you want to create more boxes to put people in, as you won't accept simply just being a man or a woman based on being born male or female (and reaching adulthood, obviously people are boys and girls before becoming men or women), but believe you need this "freedom of expression" to broadcast what sexist stereotypes you feel more comfortable with - thinking the world needs to adopt the sexist view you lot have (you fail to see just how much you have in common with Conservatives). Replacing objective definitions which are based in physical reality, with entirely subjective metaphysical claims, is not logical in any way, is not morally superior, and is demonstrably harmful, not least to female rights and protections, but also to practically anyone that buys into it as it warps people's perception of the underlying issues. It hinders people in their quest for individuation, creating this false narrative of them becoming more "authentic" when the total opposite is true, they believe they need validation from others in order to be happy etc. instead of being encouraged to find more inner strength and resilience with less reliance on how people see them. Demanding to be legally recognized as the opposite sex of what one is, is in no way shape or form more authentic than accepting the physical reality one is born into. To believe we as individuals can have 100% control over our identity in society, what we are seen as by others, in interaction with, and in relation to, society/the world/physical existence is a fool's errand, it is a delusional understanding of reality and existence.
Interestingly, before this prominent movement came into the spotlight, I often used to hear discussions about the unique qualities of women and men within the context of relationships. Some men stated that they couldn't perceive certain women as women, and I have also encountered women expressing similar sentiments. While watching this, it reminded me of these previous conversations, and I realized that the traditional understanding of gender/sex can involve ambiguous sexualization.
It does not stand to reason that ambiguity in personality types automatically results in the acceptance of the philosophies being espoused by this professor.
Judith Butler says that parental incest against children is sometimes not a violation. This is “queer theory.” Hat tip to Derrick Jensen for compiling the quotes from Butler (and for his commentary in between the Butler quotes). Here are Butler’s words “queersplaining” why parents raping children is sometimes okay: In her 2004 book Undoing Gender, she wrote, “It is not necessary to figure parent-child incest as a unilateral impingement on the child by the parent, since whatever impingement takes place will also be registered within the sphere of fantasy. In fact, to understand the violation that incest can be--and also to distinguish between those occasions of incest that are violation and those that are not--it is unnecessary to figure the body of the child exclusively as a surface imposed upon from the outside.”[1] So here she is arguing that sometimes parent-child incest is not a violation. She also wrote, “The reification of the child’s body as passive surface would thus constitute, at a theoretical level, a further deprivation of the child: the deprivation of psychic life.”[2] This is the same old pro-pedo argument we’ve seen so many times already: if you perceive children who are being fucked/raped by adults as the victims of sexual abuse then you are oppressing and objectifying the child. And she wrote, “So I keep adding this qualification: ‘when incest is a violation,’ suggesting that I think that there may be occasions in which it is not. Why would I talk that way? Well, I do think that there are probably forms of incest that are not necessarily traumatic or which gain their traumatic character by virtue of the consciousness of social shame that they produce.”[3] And there we go again, with the same old pro-pedo notion that it’s not the child rape that is harmful: it’s the social stigma that is harmful. And to bring it all home, she suggests, along with the other pro-pedo queer theorists and anarchists, that prohibiting parent/child incest is in itself harmful: “It might, then, be necessary to rethink the prohibition on incest as that which sometimes protects against a violation, and sometimes becomes the very instrument of a violation.”[4]
Right because there’s masculine women and feminine men. But a feminine man is still a man and still will have some masculine traits and behaviors that will never change. It doesn’t matter what society does or if they were told they were a girl from day one and were treated like a girl their whole life. It’s happened. One of the gender theory founders (who was a sick pedophile child abuser) did a study where he did a sex change on an infant boy and his family lied to him and told him he was a girl. But he still had male traits. He was still miserable being confused thinking he was a girl when he was a boy the whole time. He ended up lol himself. Gender definitely isn’t a social construct. Have children and you’ll see it. With little babies and the way women and men act around children. This whole theory is a lie made up by a pedophile. Pedophiles are pushing it on children. It’s disgusting and wrong.
@joaodecarvalho7012 I believe she is in fact a scientist, is she not? Like literally that's what studying gender from an academic perspective is about. But what do you think?
@@brianhunt4164 No, she does not do scientific research on sexuality, and she explicitly says that she is not interested in what science has to say about the subject. Her references are philosophers from decades ago, such as Simone de Beauvoir and Foucault. She also politicizes her “theory”, turning it into on anti-establishment protest or something.
Gender is also connected to this. As is the word gene, and the word genetics. The 'gen' part of the word comes from the ancient greek word for birth, 'genesis'.
Human sex is a social construct that classifies certain physiological features human bodies tend to have into 2-3 boxes (3 depending on your view on intersexuality). Different societies and cultures have had different understandings and definitions of sex, it often varies from medical professional to medical professional! Human sex itself serves to enforce the binary structures we try to break and feeds into the essentialization of our bodies.
@@Phiwipuss Men and women are more alike than they are different, but it is anti-science to claim that men and women are the same, and only have differences created by society. Wouldn't it be more progressive to admit our differences as sexes, than to pretend that those differences are all a lie created by a great cultural conspiracy?
I love philosophy. Enjoyed the exposure. There are always questions remaining. I will not get into arguments, since we won't be able to solve them in such a short time, but I totally agree that the congruence and clarification of the main concepts (especially of justice, freedom, rights and respect, for instance) are important and may be the beginning of impartial conversations.
@@mallorga1965indeed tis no philosophy to be found here the ideology was upgraded to "cult" status somewhere between 2017 and 2020, it's now 2023 and the philosophers have finally arrived to let you know, this definitely isn't a philosophy
I think one of the most important things I've learned about myself is that I have the power to decide who I am independent of what society thinks I should be. We are all the same. I just happen to be born in a male human. I emerged from this human just as you and everyone else did. We should all strive to have self empowerment without having power over others.
You do not have the power to decide 'who you are', if 'who you are' refers to your fundamental construction. You can choose your personality, the qualities you choose to reinforce, even behavior. But who you are is a matter of fact, and not a matter of your personal aspirations.
@@burgerbobbelcher No. you cant - you are born either a boy, or a girl. That's why we recognize them as boys and girls. You cant apply your stupid fairy tale on the facts.
@Matt But do you really? Can you really emancipate yourself from physical reality? Can you be suddenly less tall? Have a different hair Color or be an animal? Or be less old? Now a gender feminist would say that woman and men are only different with their sexual organs. For a social constructionist everything is a social construct. But is that really true? Actually we know it is not true. Research is very clear on that. Doesn’t mean we are born very differently or that society has no influence but there are such things are inherent differences. Why are there two genders if they are by default entirely the same?
Why would someone dismantle strict definitions only to subscribe to another strict definition? I’m inclined to think that they believe greater happiness would be gained in the defection along with greater ease in one way or another. It’s a risky gamble to venture into the unknown and make a permanent choice to solve a problem that may be temporary. One may find equal or less ease. Expansion of the definition or creation of a new term altogether seems the more beneficial strategy.
A very interesting speaker. There's a lot of angry content on this site against the words 'gender', 'woke' and 'feminism'. It's very easy to get caught up in it all. Professor Butler spoke with only reason and common sense. No anger, just an invitation to re-think the way we see each other and the world around us. I think that there's a lot of fear amongst people regarding gender and roles in society, and a strange focus on male athletes competing in women's competitions, and it's sad that this kind of subject is the focus, when it really doesn't affect most people's lives. There's a much more fundamental point here about choice and freedom.
I have read the section of her book that the professor, Amy Jemgochian whom I love from the UC Berkeley gave out in my class at the art institute. I never thought she is this young. I liked her writing and was helpful to read it.
surely she can just respond to Butler’s texts? If gender performativity is wrong, you can show that in writing without needing a “gotcha” moment no? it’s what every other respected academic does
@@dimercamparini cause debates rarely bring out the truth. Most people just wanna "win" debates and not genuinely try to have a discussion and add to the knowledge base. Its mostly a fancy dck measuring contest rooted in tribalism nowadays. It seems you also fall into that category.
@@itsbenbitch14 It was proven completely wrong by its inventor - Dr John Money. Look up his experiment with twins. His appalling experiment proved his theory of gender (which he had invented) to be completely wrong - yet he claimed success and his deeply traumatised victims had to expose themselves in public in a deeply intimate way in order to let the world know he was lying. They both went on to kill themselves. This is the foundation of all gender theory and now trans-ideology - deeply, murderously sociopathic and toxic right from the start. Yet lawgivers are trying to impose this on the public?!? WTF is going on? Trans ideology - and its nonsensical notion of self-identification - has nothing to do with the rights of Trans people to identify as hey please - The ideology is about forcing someone's by-definition unverifiable statements about their by-definition unverifiable subjective feelings onto others even when in defiance of the very evidence ofvtheir senses. That is unspeakably grotesque forced-faith with which only the weak-minded could comply
He/she is not cosmic he/she exists. If you are a father you probably met him/her in the adminstrative establishment where the "birth certificate" (or equivalent term) was registered. This day you assigned your child a sex, a first name, a date and so on. BTW Trump agrees: Ex-US President speech on "left-wing gender insanity" The January 31, 2023 "... establishing the only genders recognized by The United States Government are male and female and they are assigned at birth..."
There is a doctor, who puts the assigned sex on a birth certificate, which has to be certified by a county govt office. So yes, everyone is assigned a sex at birth.
Does anyone else find that an epic soundtrack playing at the same volume as someone speaking not only makes it harder to pay attention to what she's actually saying but also maybe changes the message of the video a little bit? It's like the speaker is being put up on a pedestal in a god-like fashion, as if to motivate an army to fight. I can only speculate but couldn't this amplify the degree to which people hear her words as emotionally charged and kind of motivate them to dig in their heels whether they agree or not?
I'll go one better: I wish they took out all the b-roll protest footage too. I know we have to appeal to dwindling attention spans, but I wish they could have just put the camera on her and left it there. Everything else feels emotionally manipulative.
Great observation! Thanks! Goebbels would have loved this era we are in. All this potential to propaganda! I Bet we would see a lot of Hitler's discourses with environmental epic music. Goebbels believed that music could create a public emotional and spiritual experience competitive with religion. Concert halls with their darkened auditoriums and formal settings exposed the audience to an experience similar of going to church. The music of Wagner was the centerpiece of the new "Aryan" spirituality, aiming to attain the same "impact generated by traditional Christian religious ecstasy and devotion". Not to say she is anything like Hitler! Of course I don't belive that.
@mathiasrennochaves3533 I can certainly see the value of invoking historical context here. I'm told history does tend to repeat itself if we don't understand and remember it. I can even appreciate a little bit that you'd want to muse about hypothetical scenarios of what Nazis would be doing today. We are certainly living in a world where individual actors and organizations with significant resources are trying to influence what we think and feel. I wonder though - genuinely - if maybe you could clarify and elaborate on what you think about this video - maybe even how you feel when you watch it or listen to it? I find it hard to tell if your final comments are authentic or tongue-in-cheek.
@user-kd7qu5hj5q Correct. Gender norms or gender expectations are absolutely a construct to a degree, yes. And yes, that is certainly limiting to women who aren't particularly feminine or men that aren't particularly masculine. And I feel for them! However, when society at large conflates gender and sex as the same thing by stating, for example, "You're not a real man because you like pink" or, "You're not a real woman because you're a tomboy" they don't mean it LITERALLY. The most conservative person on earth doesn't actually believe these gendered stereotypes are what makes one a literal woman or a literal man. It's simply metaphorical. (Sexist and unfair, yes, but not literal!) The problem with gender ideology is when activists proclaim, "Trans women are women" they mean it quite literally. They mean this to be a biological reality, when in fact, it is only an ideological reality. You can't simply speak whatever you like into existence, as Butler naively asserts, and have it be true. I can't say, "I'm 15" and have it be true if I'm actually 26. Likewise, a gender nonconforming man can't say, "I am a woman" and poof! Suddenly it's true! Perhaps he might be relatively passable depending on how far along his transition he is, but he's still not literally a woman. In the same way I'm not literally 15, even if look 15, he's not literally a woman just because he passes as one. And for the most part, the question of "passability" isn't important anyway. If a man wants to present as the opposite sex in a public space, let's say, like a Starbucks, it doesn't really matter whether or not we take him at his word when he says he's a woman... and it would be quite impolite, and maybe even cruel to point it out to him. After all, he should have the right to live however he likes. I have no problem using preferred pronouns in contexts such as this. However, the fundamental truth of biological reality becomes distinctly clear when, for example, a man asserts he is literally a woman, no different from a natal female, and demands access to intimate female spaces like changing rooms, women's shelters and women's prisons. There have already been many reported cases of trans woman absolutely dominating cis woman in sports, and even more horrifying, reported cases of female inmates being sexually assaulted by self purported trans women in female prisons. The lack of safeguarding in the name of an ideology is already genuinely harming women. My stance on this is fairly simple: "Your Liberty To Swing Your Fist Ends Just Where My Nose Begins". One has the right to perceive and present themselves however one chooses. However they should not have the right to impose that perception onto others and they should not have the right to access intimate female spaces when it is quite obvious the person in question is biologically male. To pretend one doesn't notice otherwise is simply a PC move in this strange "Emperor's New Clothes" era where we are being gaslit in real time. And it's all at the expense of women and girls.
Fundamentally, the problems and arguments lie in the distinction between Sex and Gender. The vocabulary we use to define Male and female sex and gender is the same, and so there lies the confusion on both sides, even in the lgbt community itself. We should not deny the existence of Biological and Psychological differences, nor should we think that they are the same thing. I think in order for different sides to agree is to acknowledge the existence of Sex and Gender and not try to treat it as some religion that can be left to one's own beliefs.
I can almost agree with what u said, but the problem relies on how broad gender actually is. Gender is an identity and people identify as whatever the hell they want. I don't have problem saying that a trans woman is a woman or that a trans man is a man, but I will never believe in what you identify if you're out of one of these 2 gender (Man and woman). And that's where things starts to get messy. Gender Ideology believers like to say that people should treat them by their right pronouns, but a lot of them don't even have a gender to begin with/transitions gender every second. And if you refuse to call that weird guy as deer/deerself (? XD It exists, there is a Twitch user called Ferocious that identifies himself as a deer) because... well, you can't be gender deer, it doesn't exist (You're a human being, to begin with) these gender freaks will do everything they can to destroy your life. That's actually the only real problem with all of this gender ideology thing that a 100% agree. Non binaries doesn't exist and forcing people to deny science to accept someone else's identity is the definition of dictatorship.
@@pedrovitor5324 the thing is, we have terms already available to describe them. A trans man is exactly what the term states as with trans woman. You don't need to change your beliefs about who should be called what. Once the politicization of this issue dies down we'll forget about each other's genitalia and get back to hating everything else about each other.
@@pedrovitor5324 "these gender freaks will do everything they can to destroy your life" is all I need to know about you........ It's not your life that is being destroyed. You talk about dictatorship, yet your words are fascist. Maybe take a closer look at yourself, and what's in your own heart.
Gender is a believe system. It’s what I and only I believe what suits me the best. It’s unfalsifiable. Recognizing that is very important in this debate. If we can live for thousands of years with religion, I don’t see any reason why can’t find a way to accept it in our society.
What's the point of gender? Why is it so important to define and put someone in a box, if it's a spectrum and everyone is different? Why did we have to complicate our lives? As a gay man that identifies as a gay man, I'm ashamed of this ideas.
Its not important... men are free to be as masculine or feminine as they want... the problem arises when just because the are feminine they pretend that makes them a woman... a male who call himself a woman doenst make him a woman, it just makes him a liar.
Gender evolved over billions of years for the purpose of reproduction. Male attracts female and they copulate and have children. But there are many diseases in nature and some things in nature don't work as nature designed them to work. Everything in the human body has some type of disease attached to it. Some people are born male and some people are born female and there is no doubt about their gender. But some people are born with a diseased gender i.e. a male that feels female and a female that feels male. Diseases are a part of life and medicine is yet to get a handle on the vast array of diseases that affect us humans.
I think the very essence of this is the description of it. If you do not describe it yourself. Someone else will do it for you in a way that you are not truly in to it. (Over a year yeah. I just watched the video and read your comment 😊)
“The sex you’re assigned” vs “The sex you become” needed more context, because I was onboard the sex ≠ gender train but when you dropped that one without additional context, you lost me, I’m sorry.
@@rufusdashiell2706 You could also enlighten me if you have a working definition for non-biologically-informed sex in addition to whatever term we’re now using to refer to XX vs. XY chromosomes instead of slapping me with a sophisticated insult devoid of actual information.
The term gender was created to be used interchangeably w sex since the word sex has two different meanings. It's to help people communicate more clearly which is what language is for but it can also be used as a weapon to vilify people, control how they think, or just confuse the shit out of them. My take is that people conflate gender with gender expression or personality. This theory seems to be built on stereotypes, you're saying if someone is gender nonconforming they aren't actually that gender. I also disagree w treating someone differently based on skin color, sex or any other immutable characteristics
It's come out that pervert doctors and degenerative actors with a really sick fetish are mainly responsible followed by a wave of online pedophiles whispering in their ears of neglected youth, More and more people are coming out. Happy Straight Modesty Month by the way.
"The body is not a fact"? The fact that someone who is so well educated on the subject is making such glaring reification errors is continued problem with conversations on gender.
@@callumarcher8111Philosophers who touch on biological topics such as biological sex, are overstepping their boundaries outside their area of expertise.
@@yusakuzgun2824 but you can force your worldview? and think that this world belongs only to people like you? understand that nobody is forcing you to do shit, you are only mad that lgbtq+ people are more free to live their life, have representation in the media and have a voice. You are free to go live in the woods with your children and isolate them from everytign. But stop being egocentric and think that the world evolves around you because it doesn't.
well true freedom doesn't exist because we're living in a society, so all decision you make for your life can be harmful to someone else indeed. The true freedom is a lie and cannot be taken seriously. Find a fact that might help your argument.
@@yusakuzgun2824 well the problem is that usually the mere existence and presence of the “other” like e.g. a trans-person, is considered to be forcing your worldview onto others
Lots of food for thought in here. I like that she brings up the language and how it shapes thought. I've been thinking for some time that part of the confusion around gender is caused by the deep connection that the word "gender" has to biological indicators - genes, sex organs, hormones. We need a separate word or even several words to delineate behavioral gender, emotional gender, psychological gender - CHOSEN gender. Using the same word for the part you have no control over and the part you have complete control over makes no sense.
Fully agree. Personality(includes interests and temperament) is a better term, and already exists. Gender is just redundant in what it brings to the world as it risks confusing people as it’s deifinition is not agreed upon, and what it tries to refer to are better explained by either sex or personality
@@notmyrealpseudonym6702 Biology is inextricably linked to personality. We are not all of the same mind, but none of us could have a mind without a brain.
@@SF2036 and yet each one of use is biologically COMPLETELY UNIQUE. Even identical twins diverge through environmental factors and how they impact the body. To pretend that 8 BILLION unique sets of chromosomes - combined with 8 BILLION different life experiences can only result in two gender related dispositions and that those genders MUST correlate to ONE HALF of one chromosome pair... well that's just completely absurd.
content warning: shower thoughts, but is the answer to dysphoria really to encourage people to change everything about their body? like even if it is safe and effective, gender is STILL societally bound by sex in most places. rather than fighting and trying to streamline highly subjective concepts that differ from culture to culture, isn't it more important to realize and tell younger people that neither sex NOR gender/pronouns/voice/body type define us and make the best of what we have? instead of trying to define our gender, should we try to stop gender from defining us?
maybe it's not the answer. Maybe people are right when they say that changing the body you have through hormones/surgery/etc so that you can go from one box to another is ultimately futile for some people. Maybe the push to liberate people from discrimination on the basis of sex and gender, when done wrong, makes some people feel like, oxymoronically, their right to define themselves is being taken away- and no matter how far that strays from the original movement, that feeling is valid. But I don't actually think that "people should have the right to change their bodies" and "we should stop gender from defining us" are contradictory statements. I don't think transgender liberation involves trying to "streamline highly subjective concepts", nor do I think most trans people want to. I'm transgender. I have dysphoria. I'm not sure about medically transitioning yet, but I have gone by a different name, used a bunch of pronouns other than the ones I was socialized with, and shrugged at so, so many different people asking me what my gender was and how I knew. I don't know what my gender is! And what I've found, in both trans and cis people, is even when people are very confident in what gender they are, if you ask the average person what makes them a woman, or a man, or a bunch of other things, and what makes them sure- they'll get a little foggy eyed, and you'll get a bunch of different answers. Your very conservative grandmother might tell you it's because she was born a woman, and she's never had a problem with being one. Your transgender schoolmate might tell you it's because he always wanted to go through male puberty, and when he didn't, he knew there was something wrong with him. Your cisgender uncle might confess that, although he's never felt the need to be traditionally masculine, he has always felt like a man- and although others might not have understood that distinction, he knew it didn't really matter. Your genderfluid cousin might tell you it's because xe likes wearing flowery dresses and suits, likes being Mr. and Ms., and likes being pretty and handsome, and when people tried to force xim into one category, xe disavowed all unchanging labels. the fact is that it's very difficult to stop gender from defining you when *so* many things in society do that for you- from primary school lunch tables to sleepovers, from school sports to locker rooms to public showers, from clothing shopping to period pad packaging to advertisements what your sister and brother get for birthday presents, nearly everything you will do in life comes with the connotations of male vs. female, boys vs. girls, pink vs. blue, and somewhere in there, whatever the hell is going on with the boy moms of tiktok. That's fine for some people. a lot of people won't notice, or they'll take it as the way life needs to be in intelligent societies. But others might take issue with that binary. whether it is because they want to sit with the boys and the girls at lunch, or because they feel like those systems are used to oppress women, or because they don't think they were given the manual to those rules, or because they want in on the other side, there are always going to be some people who are very uncomfortable with being told, "this is how your life needs to be, and everyone else is fine doing what they need to do". And, like I've already said, even if it seems like a mere sliver of the larger population, those feelings deserve to be heard. What you're describing isn't impossible- I think it's a good goal! I think a lot people would benefit from knowing that their gender/pronouns/voice/body type don't need to define their lives. But it's very hard to constantly have that other voice telling them that gender is a fact, sex is a fact, body type is a fact, and any and all discomfort with the cards you were dealt makes you stupid and sick. Maybe in a utopian society, gender/pronouns/voice/body type wouldn't define the way you were treated in a society at all, but they do, and since we're social creatures, that does define a big part of your life (unless you live alone in a cave underground, which, with the way things are going right now on the surface, can't blame ya). I think you're right when you say that we should make the best of what we have, but I also think that sometimes, making the best of what we have involves shaking things up a little. A man, trans or cis with a very high voice shouldn't feel like he needs to change his voice to be accepted as a man, but what if he's talked to his therapist and wants to start voice training so that he's treated better? Is that okay? If it is, is that only because he's been assessed by a medical professional? is it okay if he's cis but not if he's trans? if it's not, why? Is trying to change this aspect of his body a way of avoiding addressing his negative self image, or will it help? Should he suck his discomfort up and deal with it to inspire all the other high-voiced men out there? I ask these questions honestly because like I've already said, I don't have all the answers, and I don't pretend I do. These are things that I debate, both with myself and others. Is the right to change yourself the same as the right to self expression? Are those rights inalienable? Does a random lawmaker you've never met who lives ten hours away from you have the right to tell you what parts of yourself you should love, and which ones you should hate? I think people change themselves all the time, both temporarily and permanently. I dye my hair purple every winter because I get bad seasonal depression, and the bright colors make me feel happy. People may start going to therapy because they want a more positive outlook on life. Actors put on costumes, makeup, and even elaborate prosthetics to look like what they strive to imitate. People have their last name legally changed to reflect the relationships they have with the people they love. People have their badly damaged limbs amputated because they don't want intensive, painful restorative surgeries. Cisgender women have their breast size reduced because of back pain, or enlarged because they feel that makes them more feminine. And, most critically to the whole international discussion, transgender (and cisgender!) people use different pronouns than the ones they were expected to, change their names, go on hormones or hormone blockers, and get surgery that chances the shape of their body. All of these experiences are different because we're all different, and we change as a more natural part of life than this whole idea of "gender" ever was. those changes might be difficult. The reactions of the people we care about might hurt. But doesn't it matter if someone wants them, and if it changes an important part of the unique life they live for the better? I don't think transgender liberation comes at the cost of freedom to live the life you want. Humans aren't a set of preset options for gender/pronouns/voice/body type, and I don't think anyone genuinely believes that. I think some people are scared of change- if a transgender woman faces misogyny on the basis of her gender expression, what does that mean for the cisgender woman who always viewed discrimination on the basis of sex? If we broaden and increase these categories and allow people to choose how they express, why they express that way, and what they view themselves internally, that might be scary for some people. And that's okay. It really is. But no one is forcing your children, your friends, or you to act a certain way because of trans liberation. We want you to live your life on your terms, just as we wish people would calm down about the conspiracies they read on Facebook and let us live ours. sorry for leaving an essay length reply on your comment, random internet stranger. I probably misspelled some things, could have worded others better, and I'm definitely missing some important stuff (aren't we all?). But, yeah. Just wanted to put that out there for your enjoyment, criticisms, and discussion, however you feel about it.
The reason doctors recommend trans affirming care is because it's been shown to be extremely effective. The mental health issues in the trans community are well known and in particular the suicide rate being 10x higher than the general population. Trans folk that go through the whole protocol - therapy, then puberty blockers, then HRT, then surgery (when they're adults) by contrast actually have better mental health than the general population. It being safe and effective isn't something to brush aside when the treatment saves lives. Having a more tolerant society is also needed but this isn't an either/or imo
When they said "bodies can be more free to breathe, to move, to love" -- my mind immediately went to chest binders and I was like... that ain't breathing better or moving better.
@@im2randomghghthat is a lie. There are not long term studies of hormone replacement effects, or surgeries, etc, mainly because they are experimental stuff. You can give your opinion, but do not lie, that's wrong
@@TheScaredLittleScholar omg this is the most detailed, logical and empathetic description I have seen about this topic. I really want to thank you for writing this in such a lucid way. In fact, it's probably the best youtube comment I've ever read :) I am cis-gendered but this helps me understand trans people and our society so much better and helps me be a better ally and a better person.
Sex is not “assigned” at birth. It is observed and noted. It is determined at fertilization. Live anyway you want, but don’t tell me biology is subject to your feelings.
Not exactly. Fetuses start off with the same genitalia ("female") and then hormonal environment allows the genitalia to masculinize or feminize. This is why biological women with XY chromosomes and biological men with XX chromosomes exist. Then you have the condition guevedoces, where a infant is born with a vagina and then grows a penis at puberty due to there not having been enough DHT in utero. Trans men's clitorises likewise masculinize on testosterone - they essentially start growing a penis, which have been known to get up to 4.5 inches - even outside of the critical periods of puberty and in utero. Sex is in a way largely a state of biology rather than a binary immutable fact per se. For all your "facts don't care about your feelings" crowing, the fact is that the scientific consensus simply doesn't agree with you on this, in fact I encourage you to ask endocrinologists or other biological scientists about this. There's a reason that refrain is ironically way more likely to come from Christians than atheists.
The background music on this is really distracting being at roughly the same volume as the narrative. This might not be a good listen for folks with sensory processing differences.
Disingenuous is too kind a word to describe Butler’s linguistic sleight of hand in deliberately conflating sex and gender from the first statement that sex is assigned at birth to the way she hitches her gender wagon to so many other social issues. The heartbreaking damage done to biological heterosexual and lesbian women and girls is made even morally reprehensible by her glibness.
Sex isn’t “assigned at birth.” It is determined at conception and observed at birth, if not earlier by sonograms. It’s utterly unscientific to use the phrase “assigned at birth,” and the phrase is nothing more than Orwellian.
@@sohu86x I will not “chill my pants!” It’s only become “common practice” in the last few years because Leftist Loons have attempted to change the language. We don’t have to acquiesce to anti-science language manipulation. In fact, we should resist it at every opportunity.
What is problematic to me in discussions about gender is how to evaluate the respective weight given to a) my personal and subjective definition of "my" gender and b) gender as a social construct. That is, in this area, how much do I get to proclaim my own gender? Is 100% personal freedom/power in this realm what I/we want? What balance is there between what I think and feel...and the communities that I participate in? Is it okay for me to lay down my own internal and subjective truth and learn from those around me? When am I being oppressed...when am I being helpfully challenged? Is it ever okay for me to sacrifice some part of my individual identity in order to help or love the persons that I share community with? From an anthropological view I don't think it's really possible to 100% define ourselves. We ARE influenced by the communities around us, both small ones and large ones. If we feel accepted and participate in a heterosexual community, that community will influence how we engender ourselves. If we feel accepted and participate in a queer community, that community will influence how we engender ourselves. (And, of course, the reverse is true...i.e. when we don't feel accepted in a community...that affects how we engender ourselves too.) I sense that much of how we define our identity, gender and otherwise, is more about power than any intrinsic fixed truth of who we really are. To me, modern life can feel like it's a cult of the individual. There is so much pressure on people to define who they are, as if it's every person's individual job and responsibility. I think this is a delusion. This is not to say that any status quo is "right." Clearly social norms (big society, local community, chosen community, mixed community, family, etc.) can be oppressive and insensitive. Social norms can also be affirming, supportive and comfortable. But they are always there. Nobody establishes their own gender by themselves.
This is what is making this discussion so problematic. First and foremost, you need to understand that gender is NOT a social construct. It is, at best, a social label. It IS performative in the sense that you need to be what you are, but what that is is determined by your body. By which I am not trying to say that whatever body you are born in is what you should see yourself as. Biology is not a perfect machine, and we humans have added all kinds of chemicals to the mix that have increased the failure rate of the already imperfect genetic mechanisms. My point is that you cannot really do anything about what your body, your brain chemistry, your hormones, tell you to be. This means that the question of subjective definition does not arise. You perform your "personal" gender, including, in the worst case, gender assignment surgery, if that is what is necessary for you to feel okay with yourself, then society looks at you and tells you what you are. Where the whole gender discussion is going wrong imo is that these days every freak is eager to claim their own little label, when what they are is actually just a man or woman with a bit of a freak attitude. A bit of atypical behavior or preferences, a certain sexual kink, nothing really worth starting a discussion over. As a social being, the first question you should ask yourself is: am I really that special that the rest of the people should acknowledge that? Do I need to bother them with it, or do I already have enough freedom to live my life within the regular label that is being assigned to me?
@@Scarletpimpanel73 surely it is both? any social construct is a consensus on [whatever] that becomes socially 'real' as a result through the performance by individuals... but the origin of that social construct in itself has to arise from somewhere, specifically in first one and then more and more people performing what initially is an innovation on an individual level. it is then always performative and, when it gains some sort of social 'critical mass' it takes the form of a nameable and recognisable social construct that encompasses minor individual variances, trends towards a normative form, and remains 'real' for as long as it serves a sufficient number of people within that society.
@@Volkbrecht Exactly! This motley crew of freaks, etc. give me a headache. What I've realised is how much they are affecting the mental health of society. Now I get truly anxious when I hear the word trans because I think what is the latest insanity I am going to hear. The last I heard and saw was a man claiming to be a trans 'woman', at a rally, asking other men claiming to be trans 'women', to punch out biological women and being applauded for that. How??? These are clearly women hating men who have women envy/jealousy and want to claim woman and womanhood for themselves because as narcissistic men, they have deluded themselves they make better women than actual women. The whole thing is insane.
This video isn't going to provide you with a one sentence zinger. Much like race, gender requires cross disciplinary academic study. If you want to listen to what she's saying, she will provide you with an in-depth breakdown of gender and gender identity. This is an expert who has dedicated her life to academic research and sociological questioning. Assuming you know better just because you disagree is insanely arrogant.
@@wynburke It isn't a matter of disagreement. People just want to have it explained to them. Before getting into all the details, what does 'gender' actually mean?
Imagine coming into a video about a subject as vague and subjective from culture to culture as gender, thinking it's going to provide you with a rigid definition.
If gender is a social construct as Butler claims, why should we assume the individual has a right to determine their own gender for themselves? In other words, doesn’t the meaning of “social construct” include created by society? On the other hand, if it is the individual’s right and responsibility to determine their own gender, how and why is society as a whole obligated to respect the individual’s choice of said gender? Once what was a social construct becomes solely an individual construct, then all sorts of complications and outright absurdities arise.
Since people are social animals, maybe we unconsciously determine which social constructs are more appropriate to us (also with regards to one's sexual orientation). On the other hand, maybe it's all just a misconception in our minds that, under some social and phycological circumstances, compells us to choose a particular socially defined gender role, but in reality one's gender role is only an approximation of one's actual preferred behaviour and attitude in the society. This "actual preferred behaviour" probably is also socially influenced biological mechanism anyways though.
At the same time, if individuals make the society, doesn't the society and it's constructs rely on the individuals? It's like a two way street. Both can have positive and negative consequences.
@@akiadima3814 Yea, I guess it’s not an either/or but a both/and kind of thing. Still, the notion that a lone individual has sole responsibility over a social construct like pronouns while society is obligated to go along with it makes no sense to me.
Very good point. Assume gender is social construct, it should be a sum up of the whole society's perception. "If it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, then it must be a duck". Due to the significant biological differences, it is very natural result the gender became pretty much exchangeable conception of sex after human beings had society established. If everyone can determine their gender, that might also work, but I am afraid human beings would need get back to some sort primitive society which is constructed by isolated tribes.
@@ruzica1974 the enablement of those in power and control to exploit the desires of the masses to escape from solving their actual everyday issues and instead indulge in the pretense of joining a "noble cause" and thereby dividing society further to convenience their votemongering
@@ruzica1974 the increasing occurrences of trigger responses by those who see themselves as oppressed, the increasing ease at which they get triggered, the increasing lack of restraint when unleashing their emotions, etc. there are right ways to do right things. there are also wrong ways to do right things. just as plundering shops does not serve to push for racial equality, neither do these drawbacks serve gender equality or gender-whatever-you-want
@@juzam6 'Seeing themselves as oppressed,' 'lack of restraint when unleashing their emotions.' Hmmm, are your rights under attack as trans peoples' are today? Are you told that you can't have sex without the potential life changing possibility that that one day could lead to a totally unplanned and unwanted future? Do you not see that your way is not the way for others? If you were facing your rights being removed, you would justifiably consider yourself oppressed. I wouldn't complain about you being down right pissed off about it either.
Here is what I do not understand. Why declare yourself the other gender just because of stereotypes? That's what this comes down to. Women are supposed to cook, clean, be mothers. Men are supposed to work, not cry, not cook, not wear pink, not have a purse, etc. Maybe instead of declaring ourselves the opposite gender, we should tell others that we are what we are and to deal with it.
There’s a big difference between stereotypes and the gender itself. That’s why there are tomboy trans girls and girly trans boys. People USE stereotypes to signal to others, but your gender is your gender.
I didn't transition because of stereotypes, I transitioned due to physical dysphoria. The fact that I act like a man is coincidental, or not, because it probably was also affected by my in utero development to a certain extent. I didn't get a penis because of stereotypes, I got one to have sex. You would have me live a miserable, loveless, sexless life where I felt disembodied and wrong 24/7, for what? To make you more comfortable? Your comfort with my life is your business, and you need to learn to keep it to yourself. You would have no idea I was trans if you saw me. I understand why they call us transgender, but I think most of us are better identified as transsexual frankly.
@@Matheus-ki9zoyeah but her theory makes no sense. She’s mixing being feminine and masculine with man and woman. Being a woman or man doesn’t involve anything to do with stereotypes or gender roles, it’s just your biology. A man is an adult human male and a woman is an adult human female. I’m not sure why there is confusion
I am concerced that this particular version of gender theory enables the perpetuation of gender-related stereotypes, in a way which suits the 21st century...
All versions of gender theory perpetuates nonsense and fictional ideas. It's good for freshmen level dorm room philosophical debates while stoned, but little else. The whole discipline should go the way of the dinosaurs already. There is no such thing as gender, period. There is only sex, and stuff we associate with it. There is nothing more and nothing less. If you want to call that stuff "gender" that's fine, but don't do that and then simultaneously say it should be deconstructed and use it to say apples are papers.
Butler keeps saying that sex is "assigned" at birth, BUT IT IS NOT. Sex is RECOGNISED at birth. And that is the main difference. Terminology, when not used properly, can sell any idea, agenda, philosophy or dogma, and people buy it.
People with AIS are assigned female at birth, despite having testes and XY chromosomes... Expressions like those are describing objective reality. In objective reality there are no exceptions. If there are then you're not being objective. You cannot say "all things are green, except when they're not" because you're not saying anything of any substance or worth hearing.
your preference for “recognize” changes nothing about butler’s argument or the gender discussion. the doctor recognizes sex characteristics and then assigns a sex category to the body usually based on genitalia. butler wouldn’t disagree with this
@@Graham-u2w it's not preference, but scientific research and methods. If you are not aware of the difference between "assigned" and "recognised" I recomend watching 5min speech of dr. Grossman. And then try to reply.
Medically she's correct, sex *is* assigned at birth, the doctor literally assigns you a sex based on a checklist of medical criteria. This is a useful distinction to make because of intersex people, some intersex people are born with ambiguous genitalia, somewhere between male or female genitals, the doctors have to make a call as to how to assign that person's sex and sometimes they get it wrong.
@@treeaboo Nope... Sex is established at conception and is observed and documented at birth or before. No, Gender (There are only 2 male/female... That's it) is established at conception and is observed at birth or before. Way too many conflate gender/sex with personality traits and temperament (There are a ton, and none are gender exclusive-- hence effeminate males, butch females and tomboys), and gender roles (Which vary from culture to culture, society to society and country to country--BUT, they all refer to the roles of males and females in those various cultures, countries, and societies... Without exception), as though they're all synonymous and that's a massive error. All women are born female, all men are born male and neither is a social construct, feeling, fetish nor a costume. The main problem the trans activists have is that life is based in objective reality and the trans imagination just doesn't override the vast majority of people's capacity to discern the difference. Your DNA literally organizes your physical body. DNA dictates the production of objective biological differences between males and females. 100% of the population is either male or female, even intersex people. If they have a Y chromosome, they are heterogametic and male. If not, they are homogametic and female. But you knew that because you've actually educated yourself on these conditions, right? Personality traits and temperament (Neither of which is gender exclusive -- hence effeminate males, butch females and tomboys), aren't synonymous with gender or gender roles. There is no internal feeling that is exclusive to men or women (or boys/girls), what makes anyone a man or a woman is being either male or female and reaching adulthood. Their sex and stage of physical maturity makes them men or women, not some "feeling" they have. Believing there is some "essence" specific to males or female as far as feelings go, that can manifest "in the wrong body", is akin to a religious belief, having faith in something that is impossible to prove or disprove. The thing is though, that no one on the "trans" side can actually even explain what this "essence" is, they can't even explain it to themselves yet have convinced themselves that the feeling they have means they "are in the wrong body" - without realizing that their discomfort simply stems from not realizing that they view conforming to sexist stereotypes as legitimate measures of manhood or womanhood. That is why every explanation given of WHY a male "can't be a man, but is instead woman" etc. relies upon listing stereotypical stuff, or, in some cases is completely abstract and refuses to actually provide any explanation of what they mean, simply stating they "know" that what they feel means what they say it does, even though they can't actually provide a definition of it. "It's hard to explain but I know I'm right" is an attitude one constantly comes up against - a religious faith in something they can't define. This idea that the terms "man" and "woman" carry all this baggage, sexist stereotypes, that people need to live up to or feel comfortable with is a complete fabrication coming from the "trans" side. You lot want a term to reflect aspects of your personality as well, you want to create more boxes to put people in, as you won't accept simply just being a man or a woman based on being born male or female (and reaching adulthood, obviously people are boys and girls before becoming men or women), but believe you need this "freedom of expression" to broadcast what sexist stereotypes you feel more comfortable with - thinking the world needs to adopt the sexist view you lot have (you fail to see just how much you have in common with Conservatives). Replacing objective definitions which are based in physical reality, with entirely subjective metaphysical claims, is not logical in any way, is not morally superior, and is demonstrably harmful, not least to female rights and protections, but also to practically anyone that buys into it as it warps people's perception of the underlying issues. It hinders people in their quest for individuation, creating this false narrative of them becoming more "authentic" when the total opposite is true, they believe they need validation from others in order to be happy etc. instead of being encouraged to find more inner strength and resilience with less reliance on how people see them. Demanding to be legally recognized as the opposite sex of what one is, is in no way shape or form more authentic than accepting the physical reality one is born into. To believe we as individuals can have 100% control over our identity in society, what we are seen as by others, in interaction with, and in relation to, society/the world/physical existence is a fool's errand, it is a delusional understanding of reality and existence.
Honest questions (assuming that the definition of gender portrayed in the video is true): Why do transgender people want to change their sexual characteristics instead of just carrying themselves as men/women/whatever they feel like? Aren't people who identify as men/women purely based on the so called "social construct" just perpetuating the gender stereotypes? I ask myself this questions and I can't find a reasonable answer for them, so I don't find this definition of gender convincing. Please, I'd like to know your opinions in order to have a more nuanced view on this topic :)
i've been asking myself the same question in hopes of having a better understanding of the whole discourse, yet i haven't been able to find a convincing answer that isn't contradictory to some extent. if you feel like you're a man/woman opposing your biological sex then why change your body to fit a construct that was socially created and religiously supported to (stereotypically speaking) keep women in the kitchen and men in fights? or is it that that reasoning in itself is false and that men and women can be fluid and aren't defined by their gender roles, hence a man can be feminine, and a woman can be masculine. my problem with understanding that theory is that its sheer existence defies the sole purpose of transitioning in the first place, or does it not? what is masculine, and what is feminine then? and where do nonbinary people fit in this theory? how can they be so many theories that threaten and go against the other's principles? can multiple things be true at once, and if so, can it still be credible and of value?
This is why I support transmedicalism. Being transgender concerns social identity and perception, while being trannsexual is more of a medical condition concerning physical sex.
You need to back away from this line of questioning entirely because you'll drive yourself into a tizzy trying to answer it. Trans people, gender nonconforming people, etc, aren't a monolith. There's a lot of trans people who don't medically transition and don't change their outward characteristics, and there's many who do. Some are so bothered by their bodies that they seek medical interventions to change their sex entirely, and others arent and don't. The point of this deconstruction of gender is to move away from these questions entirely. If a trans woman wants to have a hyper feminine appearance because it's validating then there's no need to analyze her behavior or wonder if she's perpetuating stereotypes. It's simply what she wants to do. Same thing if she wants to present as a very butch lesbian. It's what she wants. Same with trans men, nonbinary people, too. Transmedicalism is nonsense, as is gender performativity theory. They have kernels of truth but neither is an adequate explanation and for me, as a trans woman who portrays a wide variety of gender presentations, I think trying to determine a grounded, solid theory on gender is a fools errand. I think Abigail Thorne of Philosophy Tube put it best in her video on the NHS. It's right near the end. To paraphrase: there are two things you need to know about gender, one, humans can indeed change sex, and two, do you want to?
It is manipulative language to say sex is assigned at birth. The sex of a child is observed by all who witness the birth and not assigned. There is a very small percentage of instances of intersex which requires further observation and weighing of factors.
Bishop George Berkeley said that to be is to be perceived; in some sense the sex or gender of a child does not exist until it is observed by members of society, a society in which concepts of "male" and "female" exist. all that to say, you can apply whatever rigidity you want to sex and gender, but you have to acknowledge that that's not something inherent to nature or the universe. also, don't even bother talking about God or the Bible. those are human societal constructions too.
@inaciocook You have to realize that one of the reasons we are all free to do as we like is because researchers like her were writing the books they wrote 20 years ago.
@inaciocook Yet, I contend that to state categorically - "I disagree" (which I too defend) while presenting no cogent explanation for your disagreement is a pity. I want to understand but (based on what you write) you are unwilling to engage with the ideas she presents or to offer your own in rebuttal.
@@free22 Researchers like her were mostly irrelevant, it's the STEM researchers that mattered. The very ones currently being prevented from being nurtured in universities because of the gender quota's in many universities that beliefs like those of her have created.
I feel like it would be pretty uncomfortable for someone's sex to not fit their gender, and maybe it's easier for them to change one or 2 parts of their body than their whole psyche. To be honest I'm not sure, I'm a cis man - you'd have to ask someone who did that themselves
@Celestina0 That doesn't resolve the contradiction. If being a woman or man has nothing to do with your genitals, why are some people changing their genitals to be a man or a woman? There is a fundamental logical flaw in gender ideology.
You can't change your sex. You can change your gender and someone who does that might express themselves in a way that makes them feel comfortable. This can be by changing your haircut or the clothes you wear or even with surgery. But this idea of changing the way you look and express yourselves isn't exlusive to trans people. Cis women might get lip filler or plastic surgery to feel more feminine and cis men might go to the gym to get more muscular. It's the same reason you don't often see men wearing a dress, because it's unmasculine and not the way they choose to express themselves. But it's important to keep in mind these gender roles aren't fixed across cultures and have changed across history.
Great point! Maybe we should have used "personality" instead of gender. Before all this, when I was younger, doctor forms asked for "gender" meaning sex. It was interchangeable and meant the same thing. People gave the word "gender" a new definition, but I think much conflict would have been avoided if we just used a different word. "Hi I'm x and I have a female/ male/ non binary personality". Sounds much clearer and easy to understand.
@@ladysensei1487 gender is just one aspect of personality, personality is much more than stuff that is related to sex, so a term like gender makes sense
@@deadeaded The term "assign" is essentially something given, transferred, appointed to someone. Sex can not be assigned, it is only verified by objective physical traits. To claim that it is assigned is to suggest that it has not objective verifiable traits by which it is identified, that's the beginning of the lie. The cultural and social significance of sex for babies when they are born is due to their parents' expectations and the obvious differential roles they occupy in the family and society. It does not happen like that with blood types. And nobody identifies as having a different blood type than what they have. So, the use of the word "assign" is to negate the objective reality of gender as being only male or female, which is nonsense because it cannot be assigned.
@@deadeaded you all have the same thinking problem of using words with meanings that they don't have, it's a dirty tactic. But I MUST stick to the strick meaning of the words in order to demand a sincere communication without tactics of manipulation. Sex can NOT be assigned in any way shape or form. Sex is a biological reality, not an emotional and illutional fluid idea to fit our personal desires. Sex is a the particular caracteristic of an organ, either the penis or the vagina with a spesific biological purpose. THAT, no human being can "assign" That is a product of biology, and exists outside of your emotions and mind. It's physical, not especulative. You, either speak English or Chinese, but you can't mix both. In other words, you CANNOT use a word with a meaning that it does NOT have in order to make an illusory point. If you don't use the correct word for the idea you bring, it means dishonesty.
@@deadeaded I know words have different meanings in specific special fields. But that is not what you are doing in this case. The word "assign" is a verb, and no dictionary gives a meaning different than what it is in general. The genitalia is born with the baby, it is not "assigned" by anyone. The functional sexuality of the genitalia is a property of its own natural biology, nobody can distort it and make a penis get pregnant, or the vagina to beget. These things are biological, independent of the will or desires of anyone. So, sex is what it is. You cannot call a triangle a circle, or a square, a sphere. An identity disorder is what you identify with, but you cannot change your sex the same way that you can not change your chromosomes. If a surgery is done for that purpose, you may say that YOU are the one "assigning" a different form, but you are unable to change the constitutional reality of what is made by biology and is seen (Not "assigned") at birth.
@@deadeaded You need to understand that sex belongs to that "raw biological reality" and so, it is impossible to be assigned. "Identity" is what in your case, you chose or feel later in life when you are more conscious of the social environment. So, you may identify as having a sex witch you do not have in your "raw biological reality" because it is in your subjective reality, which is your mind, not your body. In that case, again, YOU are the one "assigning" an imaginary sex to yourself which does not match objective reality. For that reason you cannot say that sex is "assigned at birth" Because that would be to claim that your subjective identity can override "raw biological reality" which is factually IMPOSSIBLE. We don't "categorize" people's minds or "sexual identity" when they are born, we simply recognize their physical, and so, physiological sexual trait. Of course, blood types do not have the social significance that sex has. The significance of blood types is rather physiological, less visible, and do not create a difference between the prominent social traits of the sexes. When we say "it's a boy", or "It's a girl" we know there will be fundamental biological, social and psychological differences that we cannot change. For example, only the girl will be able to get pregnant and breast feed a new child despite her blood type. And so the boy only is able to beget despite his blood type. That is UNCHANGEABLE despite the "identity" that is chosen. Together with that, nature has also bestowed the sexes with other social and psychological caracteristics that are prominent and fundamentally important for the family and society independently of their blood type. If a woman claims to be a man, and so her sex is "masculine", she is subconsciously attesting that she has the physical traits (raw biological reality) of a man. And vice-versa. Even thogh she can only get pregnant and not able to get another woman pregnant. But you give this assumption more importance than the facts. We, to the contrary, recognize the facts, we do not "assign" them based on feelings. If the original meaning of sex is the "raw biological reality" it is never assigned. We cannot assign an assumed sexuality based on personal feelings to the objective facts of genitalia and their function.
@@deadeaded I believe you are the one confused here. You are both confused about what you believe, confused about what I say, and confused at the time of wording yourself. This has been simple and easy to understan for millenia, just until a group of you decided to change reality and the minds of others. Anyone else could have clearly understood me. According to the Webster Dictionary, Sex: Either of the two major forms of individuals that occur in many species and that are distinguished respectively as female or male especially on the basis of their reproductive organs and structures. Gender: The behavioral, cultural, or psychological traits typically associated with one sex. Yes, everybody knows a man has a penis and a woman a vagina. When a man says he is a woman, he is not only "identifying" with the woman's gender, but with their sexual organs too, reason why many of them even have surgery to remove their penis and fabricate a vagina on them, reason why sportsmen, after they become "transwoman" they ignore all the other physical masculine traits that give them an unfair advantage against women in sports and compete against them robbing them from their achievements and medals. Reasons why they are demanding to abolish the words man and woman, father and mother, and to abolish father and mother's day. Reasons why some of them believe they can get pregnant and have had abortion clinics to simulate an abortion, one even had a doctor insert a fetus into his womb to give birth. Reasons why some have demanded to destroy the male public urinals to have all other men sit on toilets to urinate like women. And similar things from women. Ironically, I don't yet know of any "transmen" who have dared to compete agaist men in sports, the hypocrisy is obvious. (Continue...)
"Woman: an adult who lives and identifies as female" - So it takes two factors to be a woman, identification and lifestyle. So in that definition it is not being but doing that makes a person a woman. What does it mean that someone lives as a female?
@LaughingStock55 Your DNA literally organizes your physical body. DNA dictates the production of objective biological differences between males and females. 100% of the population is either male or female, even intersex people. If they have a Y chromosome, they are heterogametic and male. If not, they are homogametic and female. But you knew that because you've actually educated yourself on these conditions, right? Personality traits and temperament (Neither of which is gender exclusive -- hence effeminate males, butch females and tomboys), aren't synonymous with gender or gender roles. There is no internal feeling that is exclusive to men or women (or boys/girls), what makes anyone a man or a woman is being either male or female and reaching adulthood. Their sex and stage of physical maturity makes them men or women, not some "feeling" they have. Believing there is some "essence" specific to males or female as far as feelings go, that can manifest "in the wrong body", is akin to a religious belief, having faith in something that is impossible to prove or disprove. The thing is though, that no one on the "trans" side can actually even explain what this "essence" is, they can't even explain it to themselves yet have convinced themselves that the feeling they have means they "are in the wrong body" - without realizing that their discomfort simply stems from not realizing that they view conforming to sexist stereotypes as legitimate measures of manhood or womanhood. That is why every explanation given of WHY a male "can't be a man, but is instead woman" etc. relies upon listing stereotypical stuff, or, in some cases is completely abstract and refuses to actually provide any explanation of what they mean, simply stating they "know" that what they feel means what they say it does, even though they can't actually provide a definition of it. "It's hard to explain but I know I'm right" is an attitude one constantly comes up against - a religious faith in something they can't define. This idea that the terms "man" and "woman" carry all this baggage, sexist stereotypes, that people need to live up to or feel comfortable with is a complete fabrication coming from the "trans" side. You lot want a term to reflect aspects of your personality as well, you want to create more boxes to put people in, as you won't accept simply just being a man or a woman based on being born male or female (and reaching adulthood, obviously people are boys and girls before becoming men or women), but believe you need this "freedom of expression" to broadcast what sexist stereotypes you feel more comfortable with - thinking the world needs to adopt the sexist view you lot have (you fail to see just how much you have in common with Conservatives). Replacing objective definitions which are based in physical reality, with entirely subjective metaphysical claims, is not logical in any way, is not morally superior, and is demonstrably harmful, not least to female rights and protections, but also to practically anyone that buys into it as it warps people's perception of the underlying issues. It hinders people in their quest for individuation, creating this false narrative of them becoming more "authentic" when the total opposite is true, they believe they need validation from others in order to be happy etc. instead of being encouraged to find more inner strength and resilience with less reliance on how people see them. Demanding to be legally recognized as the opposite sex of what one is, is in no way shape or form more authentic than accepting the physical reality one is born into. To believe we as individuals can have 100% control over our identity in society, what we are seen as by others, in interaction with, and in relation to, society/the world/physical existence is a fool's errand, it is a delusional understanding of reality and existence.
Just because I would not like this idea to be lost, I think that beyond sex and gender, the underlying discussion is what we understand by democracy and how we are going to generate ways to ensure freedom to live for all bodies. I love that development that Butler does ❤.
@@SineEyed But even as bodies they are not free to live, they need to be mutilated, several times, and follow medical care all their body life. Concerning democracy, is it democracy when women cannot practise their sports between themselves and when they must accept people with a penis in their bathroom?
8:45 Quoting a change in the Cambridge dictionary from 2022 is not proof - it could be argued that the editors don’t want to be seen as transphobic just as easily as it can be argued that the meaning of the word ‘woman’ has meaningfully changed in society.
Isn't the mere fact they don't want to be seen as transphobic sufficient in indicating a change in a general societal attitude toward transphobia, therefore toward gender, therefore toward the binary categorization of man and woman?
Dictionaries don't dictate the definition and use of words, they reflect and catalogue the use of words in society. Language is a living thing that changes over time. Some words have completely changed their meanings over the years.
Quote:- "Sex is assigned to infants that has importance within medical and legal worlds" - Crumbs, that's a very strange definition. Firstly - why do we now say that sex is *assigned* at birth? That implies it is someone's opinion, they could have gone either way in their decision. Sex is not assigned, it is *observed* . There is no opinion involved, the decision could not go one way or the other, it is either one or the other, it is *observed* at birth. Secondly - sex is "either of the two main categories (male and female) into which humans and most other living things are divided on the basis of their reproductive functions".
sex is not observed at birth. they don’t test your chromosomes or your gonads or know for certain which secondary sex characteristics you’ll have. and sex is a spectrum, not a binary. if it were a binary, intersex and transexual people wouldn’t exist
I don't think this is entirely accurate as labelling an individual with sex involves an opinion on the observations. For a start, how do you assign sex to a person who has an ambiguous reproductive function (infertility, androgen insensitivity, possession of both ovaries and testes)? One might look at secondary sexual characteristics like breast development and facial hair. However, even within these areas, the ambiguity cannot be ignored. To resolve these ambiguities, an opinion is necessary. I see that the line between male and female can be very blurry. In this case, it points to the conclusion that sex is not a complete model of human biology and that there might exist a better conception or theory of sex such as a spectrum, more categories, or simply abolishing sex as a system and instead focusing on more measurable properties. Post-modernists may think any measurement you make is a social construction but it is better at least. P. S. The point is not really whether sex is assigned or observed, but that it means nothing in the context of what you are and what you can potentially be. In my understanding, the notion of assignment, as opposed to observation, serves to deconstruct biological sex in hopes of allowing people more freedom in their self-definition.
@@ChanMC153 I grant you there may be exceptions were hidden factors could change things, don't think infertility is one of them though. That's just something not working. You don't become an inbetween sex if your ovaries don't produce eggs, or your sperm don't work. Possessing both ovaries and testes, now that could make you non binary. I think the rest of what you are referring to is gender. I used to think gender and sex were the same thing, but I think gender is more about what you feel as opposed to what you are. I don't think gender can be observed or assigned at birth.
@@richardarcher3435 Saying one does not become an in between sex when one’s reproductive organs don’t work is fine. However, this raises the question of what sex actually is if it is not the production of gametes. You might say it’s the predicted reproductive function of the body, but then how exactly does that prediction work? To what extent do your ovaries have to resemble ovaries? What is the ideal set of ovaries by which you are measuring the difference? In some cultures, post menopausal women have been perceived as a separate sex entirely. Of course, they have not recognised the difference between sex and gender, the “immanent” and the “performative”. However, naturalisation of performance is observed all the time, who’s to say our perception of sex as unchangeable “natural” categories is truly natural? Gender is part of the language by which we understand the world. Just like actual languages, we cannot simply choose not to use a language if it is the only one we know. The extent to which the categories of sex is a consequence of gender is unclear to me.
Sex is NOT assigned ever. Sex is our gender, either male OR female. How is it assigned? Does the babe come out like barbie or ken, then a penis or vagina is made after the doctor makes the decision? Open the drawer marked 'Penis' and slap it on. the world has gone completely friggin nuts. Therapy for all the confused pieces of sexless meat roaming the good ole' messed up usa. goodbye, hope you guys decide what you feel like being this week. ffs
Didn't watch the whole thing but my understanding has been that sex is a physical objective reality of birth, gender is a psychological and spiritual self identity. Gender roles are arbitrary social constructs that vary between cultures and periods. Sexes are male and female, with intersex people being both. Gender is male and female with some being both. There are not 90+ genders. Sexual preferences are being erroneously labeled as genders.
I mean you're technically correct, so are you. Titles like 'Mrs.' and names are entirely social constructions, useful ones, but social constructions nonetheless.
@@treeaboo All men are born male, all women are born female and neither are social constructs, feelings, fetishes or costumes. The science shows the natural s3xu@l dichotomy of all mammals as being male/female. Humans are mammals, and they are male or female, respectively. That state is fixed and permanent. If you change the name of an apple to an orange, it doesn't alter the nature of an apple or an orange in any way, and the same is true when renaming a man something else-- like trans. It doesn't change the nature of the man. Women are all born female, and men are all born male, which makes the use of cis/trans intellectually hollow and useless
@@treeaboo The information of a personality is encoded in the brain, there is a material, objective reality from which arises the subjective phenomena of social behaviour and experience. Nothing, and I mean, litterally nothing about a human personality is "entirely social constructions." This social construct "theory" is only so widely believed because you can learn all there is to know about it in an afternoon and it easily conforms to political ideology, personal preference and self validation because there's basically no facts, it's not a scientific theory of human behaviour, it's just a bunch of guess work dressed up by careerist essay writers to sound like a real theory to scientifically uneducated people who're already inclined to believe it for personal or political reasons.
I was labeled in 1975 at 5yrs old as having "chronic sexual identity crisis". By 1983 I was socially transitioning at school and with friends behind my parents backs. By 14 in 1984 I left home and found my way to the LGBTQ part of town. I met an older Mexican trans woman named Chinga who sold me hormones she smuggled in from Mexico. So 40yrs ago I medically transitioned as a child on my own terms regardless of what others tried to tell me. I've never had one single regret about owning my womanhood in life. This is who I've always been. Now I'm a happy 54yr old post op woman living happily in California.
It seems to me that the only that has gone 'fluid' is the meaning of the word gender itself. So if gender means that little and people can do whatever they want with it until the point where it stops meaning anything, how is it still a distinction of any relevance, to which some people still want to identify as.
I ID as a dog on Thursdays and a woman of colour and lezbyan on the weekends; Mondays I play the white man with a gun telling black folks to .... well Narc. Chaos = where next ?
It is likely that, if we're able to reach a point in which we're free to gender ourselves as we please, gender will become a useless concept, yes, but we're not at that point yet.
Who says it means "that little"though? Fluidity doesn't equal lack of meaning. If I change professions from carpenter to systems engineer it means my profession has been fluid, but it doesn't take away the meaning of either of those professions, the same goes for gender. It's a role we play in society, that role can change, but at any point it has a current state and that state is absolutely 100% meaningful.
@@empireoflightz the actual difference between changing genders and changing professions is that there is something physically tangible in the essence of switching professions. You can not be a carpenter without in some way working with your hands, use a hammer, carry dry-wall, raising houses. Switching proffesions is not something you can do on a whim, it must meet certain criteria. Whatever those critera might be, these criteria are something which are verifiable by others. The problem I see with gender is that the concepts revises itself when it gets criticized, and now the term is so ubituqous that gender can essentially be anything, all the time. I could, for all you know, have changed my gender 10 times writing this comment, but I couldnt have changed my profession 10 times. The problem as to why this concept of gender isn't useful is because there is no way for you to verify whether or not i changed my gender. What we have created is an un-verifiable part of my identity which is totally free from physical and biological reality. To me that sounds alot like a spiritual soul. If concept comes to mean anything and everything, ultimately that term comes to mean nothing.
@Freddielovefootball this is typical paranoia when things change in society, as they inevitably always do, people start imagining extreme scenarios as if they're the natural continuation of the change that is happening, when they're really not. "I could've changed my gender 8 times while writing this" well the only way that could happen is if you're extremely gender fluid, and those are extreme rare cases. The vast majority of people have one gender which reflects how they actually feel inside, what role they feel they can most authentically play in society and so on, and this gender doesn't change throughout their live. What does change for a small minority of people (trans people) is that they realise that gender isn't the one they were assigned at birth and have most of the physical/biological characteristics of, and so a transition needs to happen for them to live their healthiest and happiest lives. Only a very small minority out of this small minority might be "gender fluid" in the sense that they might then at some point see it necessary to transition again, or indeed could do so 8 times a day. I say this as a NB person who knows a lot of NB and trans people, I don't know anyone like that so I can't tell you much about them. But to then say gender doesn't mean anything anymore just because it's more abstract for this tiny tiny group of people, is an extremely exaggerated extrapolation of a particular scenario. The vast majority of trans people want their body and tangible gender manifestation to be a very particular way that reflects their gender identity, and they generally want to stay that way, to the extent that current medicine allows us to. For most of us there's a clear role too that we play in society according to our gender and our physical changes are made in order to comply better with what society expects from and how it reacts to certain genders. In the case of non binary people that isn't then mostly just a made up abstract thing but a case of not being able to fit into traditional binary gender roles in very specific ways, and so we try to ask for more flexibility from society as far as those roles and expectations by expressing ourselves as neither man nor woman, and while each of us might have a unique mix of characteristics from either of those genders, that mix isn't generally subject to changing any more than a cis person might become slightly more feminine or masculine during the course of their lives.
I don't think this video even begins to approach answering the question posed in the title. At least beyond stating the question. I'm more confused than when I started.
Because she’s full of BS and loves to hear herself speak! The made up concept that she sucked out of her thumb of gender, is really just synonymous with self expression and personality! So can we get on with everything?
First I want to say I'm very sorry if my words hurt any sensibility. Here is my point , I don't understand why the debate is so strong on this particular topic. It isn't more significant than any other type of discrimination . What I mean is I see it upside-down : it seems to me that every single person is very unique and try to find in others some similarities to feel understood , just to share the very feelings of existence and luckily put words on it in order to grow one's inner peace and comprehension. I think the real problem is we (humans in society) hide behind those similarities making them strong representative statements (gender or whatever else we use to define our identity). It looks like we stay in those illusions to forget that our unique point of view crossing existence can make us feel very lonely and therefore afraid. To me , normality and stereotypes are just fake and useless shelters against this particular fear. I'd say we should try to reach ease with this idea as we are bound to each other by it. And then hopefully we'd feel grateful to have the chance to interact . I don't think we need more revendicative battling , as it feels to me that division and violence are fed by it those days. Violence is exactly what we don't want towards the other who will unavoidably always be different. Maybe we should actually learn how to "take a break from gender".
2:02 "Sex is generally a category that is assigned to infants". I hear this 'very' misleading terminology only from people pushing gender. Sex isn't "assigned", it's recognised. It exists regardless of the physician. If the baby were delivered by the mother in the middle of a forest with nobody around, the child would still be the same sex. Nobody assigns it. "Assigned" implies that it is something given. It is not. It is something innate which naturally develops during gestation. Whenever people need to use deceptive language to push their ideology, they're not pushing a gender as much as they are an agenda.
Sex is way more complicated than we generally think, so the one just looking at a baby might be wrong or only have a limited amount of data, or is looking at a baby with genitals that are not that easy to pinpoint... So yes, it's assigned. And what sex they said you were at birth might not be correct, or that easy to decide on, when you look at all the factors that makes up biological sex.
@@AlecS-p4b If you're male and a physician says you're female, then the physician is incorrect. Your sex is what it is. That's not assigning. That's a person making a mistake in 'recognising'. There are a tiny minority of cases where sex isn't readily discernible. We're talking approximately 0.018% of the population. There is a greater percentage of people born with six toes on each foot. Is number of toes assigned at birth too, or are they just 'there'? If you can easily determine sex at a glance for 99.982% of the population, which you can, I don't think we can say with any confidence or credence that sex is more complicated than we think.
I usually don’t comment but this time I wanted to have a good discussion about This topic so I believe that the reason behind A woman wants to be called a man or the opposite is because the society gives a stereotype about how a woman should look like or how a man should look like which Leads to if a woman wants to dress up like a “man” she will feel like she should be called a man , I feel like we shouldn’t change the gender we should change the stereotype + I don’t think there is something going to makes you a woman or a man other than your body because i personally Believe that not all woman acts , feels or desire the same things neither are man , what do you think? and if you think i messed a point please comment I want to hear your opinions but please be respectful ❤
the point is that the concept of man and of woman aren't fixed nor defined by society, as much as some people want it to be. I cannot agree with your statement because you part of the assumption that "a woman who wants to be called a man" isn't a man even when they say, and performe, that they are. Furthermore, the way a body is also doesn't encapsulate all of the ideia of gender, as biology doesn't always go hand in hand with the way a person may express their gender - like intersex people or trans people. Gender and stereotype aren't the same thing because the former encompasses a lot of ways one can assert their own identity beyond what masculinity or femininity is suposed to be. Physical attributes sure ain't it.
@@pedroh.pereira8292 99.9% of the time, a child's physical sex characteristics observed & recorded in the delivery room will predict his or her physical sex characteristics as an adult with astonishing accuracy. the intersex exceptions do not change the rule.
I think you are correct. What Butler pretentiously calls "gender identity" I would just call personality. Every man and woman could have their own unique personality, and still 99.9% of us can be clearly seen to belong to one of two sexes. All the confusion arises due to social pressures, stereotypes, etc.
@@ClintLock1 but gender is not encapsulated by sex characteristics, as the ideias of man and woman live outside those parameters. One can designate a gender to dolls, clothes and even elements of nature (latin languages often call the moon or the sea female and the sun male). Another point is that is impossible to essencialize sex characteristics that designate gender: the man must always have a beard? Is gender always associated with the capacity of having children? Even hormones aren't a safe way to determine a person's gender (just research the case of the woman two time Olympic champion that wasn't allowed to compete because of her naturally "high" testosterone levels - an decision made by an arbitrary marker that was later changed by the Olympic Committe) That said, even if the exception of the rule is .1%, in a global scale that sums about 70 million people that are misgendered by a reductionist way of recognizing people.
@@pedroh.pereira8292 I only meant to address your intersex point. As you summarize, yes indeed social roles, rules, and culture are very complicated, and vary widely by time and place. But the issue of "gender" ought to be demystified: it really comes down to social expectations imposed on individuals based on their sex. For instance, only women can give birth (call them "assigned female at birth" if you want... it's the same thing... and yes, some women are infertile... all this can be true). So, society expects women to give birth, so the human species will continue. A certain majority of women must take up this responsibility, or we go extinct. Obviously some women will not want this responsibility, for whatever reason. But is this some magical essence they possess, called "gender" ? Or is it simply the age-old conflict between social roles and people's inner desires? In any case the "brain in the wrong body" medical quackery brings nothing but confusion and suffering, and should be put to rest...
It's very hard to listen to Butler speak. It's as if she is intentionally using complex language to obscure the implication of what she's saying.. To my mind, the truth can always be stated in a simple and clear way.
0:33 - "At some point in life we ask ourselves, where did that assumption come from?" No, we don't. At least not the vast majority of us. I do appreciate the optimism, though.
Its always interesting to me that John Money is used to attack transpeople, when the lesson that should be taken from the John Money situation is the opposite - you cannot impose a gender on someone and insist they follow it based solely on their biological characteristics. The consequences can be severe mental trauma. This is exaclty what trans people have been arguing for decades!
@@whateverwhatever4026you shouldn’t pick your kids gender for them. what transphobes want to do to trans kids isn’t much better than what john money did to the poor kid.
@@Celestina0 That's called confirmation bias. The only reason that Rimer had an issue with his gender was that it was objectively incongruent with his biology. Gender dysphoria is when you "feel" as though there is an incongruency between your sex and gender - but gender dysphoria is a mental disorder while Rimer was simply lied to.
I was reading a children's book recently which is designed to 'educate' children on this topic. The very first page was an exercise in mental gymnastics and utter stupidity. The answer to "what is gender"? conflated sex with 'gender'. On the very next page we get the actual definition of 'gender', ie. that it's an oppressive, sexist social construct, but whoever wrote this mumbo jumbo obviously can't string two thoughts together and missed their ligtbulb moment. The book should be in the fiction shelves of the bookstore under 'comedy', not presented as fact to developing minds. Our kids have a right to a quality, factual education, not indoctrination into ideological dogma that not even the ideologues themselves understand.
Why are we confusing kids with all this gender stuff. We should tell kids You are born male or female. After that you are free to be and do whatever the hell you want. But the facts are facts like if at birth you're able to give birth then your a woman.
What would be the point? They both have their material out there to consume and digest. Also, for a deeper dive into the philosophy of the whole thing, maybe you want to look more into James Lindsay, unless you already have. Peterson has his thoughts about cultural Marxism, but ultimately his take on philosophy is more centered around the truth in religion and how to use that for self-betterment. Lindsay is much more into the philosophy and history of critical theory.
you can be born with broken software you can live with it but it's not as nature design things to be it's how people do up things escaping from own natural environment breaking own natural software making billions miserable
And this is why people find this whole thing ridiculous. They say that its essentially a mix of culture and all but theirs absolutely no grounding for what it is. I can identify as a woman and someone who is the complete opposite of me can also identify as a woman. It s not about freedom of expression, its about feeding into delusion
The point is you can feel whatever you want, thats the goal, but the society, culture and environment you live in, is influencing you on how a girl or boy has to dress, act and feel at a very young age. Girls need to take care of their families and boys aren't allowed to cry, "boys dont cry". all these little factors shape of what we think of how gender identity functions in society and how we HAVE TO act instead of how we want to.
"we no longer speak about family, woman, man, desire, sex in the same way". Perhaps for Judith, but in the majority of social groups geared towards bringing children into the world via healthy sexual reproduction, this hasn't changed.
oh well then we should ignore the change from traditional no sex till marriages to the now "norm" of sex being way more open. or hey how about mothers are a lot of the time not house wife's any more that she is a family change
Every single couple having children go through intense renegotiation of their relationship and the work/power/nurturing balance within it when babies arrive and to suggest that is not happening is absolutely oblivious. Perhaps you have not had children yet or have not spoken to parents of young children. Ask a woman how things change when babies arrive and you may find out alot about gender norms that are not working for either parent. Far less for the woman. Go ahead and ask.
@@marshhen i did not deny that when a family want a kid they will talk it out and how to organize their work life kid balance its a lot of planning of and to each couple their own ways of balancing it . i was more trying to show how few decades (a century maybe?) women were expected to be house wifes a lot of the time and have most of the work that goes on taking care of a house and kids while in modern days that became a lot more open or at least the numbers changed.
Answers to frequently asked questions in the comments:
(Note: As Butler says, there are many perspectives on gender. This is not intended to be an authoritative answer. There is room to argue, to learn, to disagree. Hopefully this answers some general questions we often see in the comments and helps the conversation move forward.)
Aren't men and women physically different? What's the difference between biological sex and gender? What does 'assigned at birth' mean?
As Butler acknowledges at 1:41, there are biological differences in sex.
To clarify: Most people are born with the sex of either male (with XY chromosomes and male anatomy) or female (with XX chromosome and female anatomy). A small proportion of people are born with different chromosomal or anatomical makeups (e.g. Klinefelter syndrome).
Gender is the role people of a specific sex play in different cultures. For example: In 15th century Italy, men wore tights and skirts, while in 21st century America that would be considered feminine. In 1950s America, most women would not have careers, while in 2023 Haredi culture, most men do not work and most women do. All of these people have similar biology, but the norms around how they live: their dress, their occupation, their manners and customs, etc. can be very different based on their sex and the society.
The phrase 'assigned at birth' refers to how most of us are raised from birth with the gender role most typical of the sex you are born. (This is often true even of people who are neither biologically male or female).
Transgender people are those who intuitively identify with a different gender from their sex or assigned gender, and decide to live as it. Nonbinary people are those who identify with neither gender, and decide to stop publicly identifying with them.
Why don't we just expand the definitions of gender to include more behaviors, rather than people having to switch genders?
It's possible to do both. People frequently identify as their assigned gender despite having some unconventional behaviors for it. Others simply feel a deeper connection to the gender they weren't raised as, and feel happier living as it. Butler argues that we should simply allow people to define themselves how they like and respect that choice.
Why wasn't anyone doing this until recently?
There are well-documented examples of transgender and non-binary people for hundreds, if not thousands of years: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_history
There are also many examples of people redefining gender over the course of history; indeed, that may be how we got from 15th century gender roles to today's. In recent memory, artists like David Bowie, Prince, Eddie Izzard--as well as movies like Boys Don't Cry, Priscilla Queen of the Desert, and Tootsie--are all famous examples of exploring different gender identities.
It seems reasonable to acknowledge humans have had a wide variety of feelings and behavior around gender. It's also worth noting that in many societies defying gender roles could--and can--come with severe social or even criminal consequences, and that likely reduced the amount of behaviors people expressed. As greater knowledge and acceptance of nonconventional identities emerges, it's possible that more people simply feel comfortable identifying and expressing feelings that might have been repressed in the past.
For a deeper dive into the scientific research around transgender issues, check out our columnist Ethan Seigel's recent article on it: bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/what-is-a-woman/
When my Brother at 11 years of age was lured by a pack of pedophiles .Ultimately groomed, used ,then basically slaughtered ! Also tried to explain gender abnormalities ! Why they are being shoved down our throats is to keep on destroying the normal balanced Families Which develop healthy communities and Culture . Divide and conquer . So the psychopath Elite can ?
I respect personality and individual identity. What I have a problem with is the gender theorist claim that a great many behaviours are incompatible with a biological sex (of which there are only two. There is no third mechanism by which reproduction may occur in humans, nor can humans switch between the two).
What the majority of people think about typical behaviours associated with certain sexes is irrelevant and it is the height of narcissism to define your personal identity around what other people think - so far as to claim, you may have been born into the wrong body because of what other people think of your body.
Of course people have always behaved differently. But it is an entirely new phenomenon for activists to claim that mere behaviour has changed their physiology, entitling them to access to the protected spaces of the opposite sex.
Don’t worry Americans, Texas will save us! Texas will show us the way forward. Texas!!!!
"As Butler says, there are many perspectives on gender."
And all of those stemming from modern gender theory (e.g., transgenderism) are incoherent.
"As Butler acknowledges at 1:41, there are biological differences in sex."
And in age groups. Hence, we not only have terms to distinguish between sexes (male and female) but also terms to distinguish between age groups (child and adult). For efficiency's sake, we call an adult human female a woman, a human child that's female a girl, adult human males men, and human children that are male boys.
"To clarify: Most people are born with the sex of either male (with XY chromosomes and male anatomy) or female (with XX chromosome and female anatomy). A small proportion of people are born with different chromosomal or anatomical makeups (e.g. Klinefelter syndrome)."
And those people are also either males or females, because your chromosomal makeup is not what actually makes you one or the other gender.
"Gender is the role people of a specific sex play in different cultures."
Nonsense. You are confusing gender itself with gender roles and norms. But if we were to equate them, it wouldn't be workable with the rest of your worldview. After all, if someone were to adhere to the roles/norms expected of men but identify as a woman, what would you call them?
"The phrase 'assigned at birth' refers to how most of us are raised from birth with the gender role most typical of the sex you are born."
No. Doctors *observe* our gender (aka sex) and simply report it. Even in those extremely rare cases in which our external genitalia mislead them on our gender, the truth is still found by taking a deeper look at our biology.
"Transgender people are those who intuitively identify with a different gender from their sex or assigned gender, and decide to live as it."
First problem: We can't possibly know what we "intuitively" identify with, because we've no basis for that comparison. We've all only been just the one gender, so we'd have no way of knowing the difference between "feeling like" a man vs. "feeling like" a woman, or indeed if there is such a difference to begin with.
Second problem: What is meant by "decide to live as (a gender)"? Again, you seem to be confusing gender roles/norms with gender itself. But someone who adheres to all of the gender roles and norms of a man but doesn't identify as one wouldn't be considered one even by you.
"There are well-documented examples of transgender and non-binary people for hundreds, if not thousands of years"
Which doesn't explain the recent apparent uptick in its popularity. And if the narrative that not going along with their self-identification causes them to unalive themselves, it becomes inexplicable why there wasn't a huge amount in self-unalivings throughout history, as people were inarguably far less tolerant of this nonsense than they are today.
"For a deeper dive into the scientific research around transgender issues, check out our columnist Ethan Seigel's recent article..."
Let's not pretend that actual science can back this worldview. Science is about objective, observable reality. Transgenderism can't even produce objective, workable definitions for its terms. And neither can any of the so-called "scientists" giving the worldview lip service.
As a trans woman, I would've hoped that Judith would've been more specific and mentioned gender role, gender expression and gender identity rather than just lump the 3 all together under the umbrella term of gender. This is because 2 of those (gender role and expression) are social constructs, and gender identity is as biological as our genetic sex. Our gender identity is hard-wired into our brains during the 2nd trimester of gestation through exposure to differing amounts of androgens, but because people are lazy, identity gets lumped in with role and expression and is classed as a construct. This gives anti-trans bigots the opportunity to dismiss my identity as just a choice when it is not. It doesn't make sense to think it is. Who would risk losing family and friends, getting beaten up or worse, and being discriminated against by the state if they had a choice in the matter?
As a feminist in the early 1970s, I was harshly criticized for wanting to be a wife and mother. I was called a traitor to the cause for not disparaging that 'toxic' role. I was shocked! Because to me, the point was to have a society where everyone is valued and free to pursue WHATEVER vocation you feel called to! The idea that women could ONLY be 'equal' if they do what men do is giving up on feminism.
Most of radical feminist theory involves lesbians and queers. No wonder most women reject this brand of feminism.
hear hear!
@@aminahmad2595 Most people don't know or care
Doubtful, especially since 'toxic' definitions weren't part of the vocabulary until the late 2000s. That's also just not the philosophy of modern feminism as it didn't matter if you got married, so long as it was a consensual setup where you weren't coerced into being homebound.
@@erikfldt390 What was it called prior to the identification of the term "toxic word"?
In a nutshell: Maybe we should just be chill if someone wants to go against the norm.
and we should be chill if people refuse not to participate in you going against the norm
@@rickperez8975 Project much? No one cares about people minding their own business, it's when reactionaries do all they can to f*** with vulnerable groups that aren't in any way affecting them.
That’s fine with me. I just don’t want to hear about it! I’m sick of this topic! 🤦🏻♀️ Can something in this world be kept private!?
@@Onceuponatime889 No one forced you to watch the video.
@@erikfldt390 I didn’t. I just needed to hear first few sentences.
What I always find interesting is for a lot of binary trans people (let’s take a transwoman for my example) they’ll often experience some of their life before they fully work themselves out in which they’ll constantly be told “you’re not a real man,” for all their feminine habits and features and interests etc. and then the moment that person goes “no actually, you’re right, I’m not a man, I’m a woman” suddenly the attack switches to “you’re not a real woman”
BD, you don't have to be anywhere near trans to hear those insults. Just be a tomboy. Just be a boy who would rather practice violin than play baseball. This is all a distraction to avoid people seeing the money leave their possession to find its way into the billionaires offshore accounts, and maybe a way to appease the crueler evangelical sects.
As a feminine gay man, this was always the case. I was made fun of for beeing too girly, but if a trans woman states her identity, then no matter how feminine she is, she is "a man". People don't care about "natural order", "biology" or "reality", they only care to excercise their control over others.
TRUE!
You are absolutely right! So are others!
Notice what you wrote about transwomen's experience of being told "you’re not a real man". We know exactly what this means. However, this statement --- “you’re not a real man” --- is not the same as that "you are a woman" nor that "you are a real woman" nor does it imply so.
However, the very moment that the person goes “no actually, you’re right, I’m not a man, I’m a woman”, at that instant the person is wrong! No, that person is still a man, but not a 'real' man, in the sense of being a manly man, macho man, or an otherwise a normal man (as difficult as it may be to define "normal" for the purposes of the current context).
And it is absolutely correct that such a person should be told “you’re not a real woman” as well as “you’re not a woman at all in any sense of the word WOMAN”.
Individuals, no matter what their preferences and behavior, should be free to live life according to their own choices for maximum happiness. Everyone's rights must be protected and advanced no matter who that person is and how he/she behaves (without impinging on others' rights, etc.).
@@fraiopatll633 So you're saying they're not a "real" man or woman? What a ridiculous notion. You can't have your cake and eat it too. The person is a "real" whatever the hell they want to be, in that "man" and "woman" do not have unambiguous definitions. I'm a man that usually does not exhibit "macho" behaviour, in fact I find it pretty stupid. I'm still a real man.
"Man" and "woman" as they pertain to how we fit into society have nothing to do with what genitals you have or how masculine/feminine your look or behave. Everyone is what they feel they are, and they are a real one of whatever that is.
I suggest you watch the video again, seems like it went completely over your head.
It is may be better to stay as you were in the beginning and not listen to what whoever says... 😂
I'm sorry that so many humans are treated like sh!t by other humans, simply because they want to live the way they want to live, in peace.
then why are they always out front and centre shouting from the rooftops and having a parade every month? That's not very peaceful. Attention lovers
@@Capergirl27our goal is to raise awareness about it until it becomes as normalized as left-handedness
I'm also sorry for how David Reimer's life was ruined by John Money
@@tornadospin9 and even if it becomes normalized, having pride is important to not repeat history
I agree with you… just let people live however they desire to live
What I love even more about Butler's performativity theory is that it cannot only be applied to gender, but also to basically every other subject position. Every group you're part of, be it an ethnicity or even a fandom of some random movie, brings its own stereotypical set of behaviours that is repeated and reinforced all the time. Makes it a very interesting tool for analysis in anthropological research
Mental illness too? Is that performative?
@@Open-6As someone with mental illness, I'd say yes, to an extent. There are certainly ways in which we feel people with mental illness are stereotypically "supposed" to act and think about themselves, and these ideas can shape our behavior. To be clear, "performative" doesn't mean something isn't real, just that there's a performative element to it, a way in which we've been socially taught to behave.
@@theprousteffect9717 separating "performative" from "worthless" or "not real" was a super important step in understanding how i interact with fashion and personal expression!! for a while i was pretty frustrated that a decent chunk of my interest in those areas was driven by approval & acknowledgement from others w/ similar design philosophies as opposed to being generated intrinsically-took me a long time to realize that the entire world of experimental fashion is built around performance, trading style that most people connect with at a base level with a more intimate connection with much fewer. it gave me a lot of peace with how i share my gender with others & what i hope to gain from it
She is amazing! And I totally agree
read more poetry...
"My whole life I've been trying to take a break from gender." I feel this so hard, but with race.
these identities are unfortunately held over us and used to oppress, these form constructs and cages, but we can find liberation through breaking the constraints and fighting patriarchy and capitalism.
Exactly, no such thing.
? just take a break? I don't know but as a math student i just focus on math, why focus on race or gender if it makes you upset and tired
@@MonkeyDLuffy-gd6se Right, as a black person in the US, I'll just not focus on it. I'm sure it's just because I'm thinking about it, nothing to do with how other people treat me, every day.
Like, are you serious?
@@RadicalTrivia well just dont try to let it consume and dictate your life
I'm here just for the comments.
Welcome brother!
Same
enjoy the scroll
Well you'll have to be quick as there's a ton of deletions already!!! Reasonable comments I might add but obviously not woke enough so auto-delete is in effect!!!
@@jamesbrown4107woke counter 1! Y’all are silly as hell! What’s reasonable to you is probably ignorance since you unironically use “wholeness”
The notion of gender is fascinating. The more I think about it, the harder it is to define it!
Gender, I have. Sex, I'm lacking.
you just ended the whole argumnet, congrats
GOAT comment fr
That's wt I'm talking about! Pop off, Sis! 🙌🏽
Can I hear an "amen!"?
LOL
This wins
"my whole life I've been wanting to take a break from gender" same judith. same.
I'm just sorry I can't "like" you twice!
@@markfoster1520haha me too 😊
lol. Mental illness is more and more common 😊
"I wish I could take a break from these infernal new clothes!" - The Emperor
see a psychiatrist asap
*grabs popcorn and opens the comments* 👀
Same 🤣
I actually couldnt wait for the video to end to read the comments 😂
We starting a flame war in the RUclips™ comments section with this one🔥🔥🔥
This argument will not end anytime soon and it's the same points from both sides every time tbh
If all you do is observe without taking a position or standing for anything, what you are is simply a coward.
Simone de Beauvoir never said that the body is not a fact. By "becoming a woman", she meant that the cultural and social expectations to which a woman is subjected shape the way she thinks, behaves, acts and sees herself. Beauvoir never denied the physical fact that a woman is an adult female human being. Feminism was about "gender roles", not about gender as something inherent in every human being from birth or even before. She wanted to show the exact opposite of such an essentialist image of women and men.
100%. I'm tired of trans identified people, "trans right activists" and "allies" purposely misconstruing her words.
Correct. First French to English book ( translation) was worst translation ever. They fixed it later but this akward notion on gender still exists.😅
The "body is not a fact" means what you basically described tho
@@jamestank8819 No, by "the body is not a fact" Butler means that bodies(!) are socially constructed. That's applied postmodernism.
@@MK-uz4mo Judith Butler is literally trans but okay
I really like it when they mention other peers in the field, it gives more insight of how great humans can be
I was overjoyed when Simone De Beauvoir was mentioned! She's my hero.
Judith Butler says that parental incest against children is sometimes not a violation. This is “queer theory.”
Hat tip to Derrick Jensen for compiling the quotes from Butler (and for his commentary in between the Butler quotes).
Here are Butler’s words “queersplaining” why parents raping children is sometimes okay:
In her 2004 book Undoing Gender, she wrote, “It is not necessary to figure parent-child incest as a unilateral impingement on the child by the parent, since whatever impingement takes place will also be registered within the sphere of fantasy. In fact, to understand the violation that incest can be--and also to distinguish between those occasions of incest that are violation and those that are not--it is unnecessary to figure the body of the child exclusively as a surface imposed upon from the outside.”[1] So here she is arguing that sometimes parent-child incest is not a violation.
She also wrote, “The reification of the child’s body as passive surface would thus constitute, at a theoretical level, a further deprivation of the child: the deprivation of psychic life.”[2] This is the same old pro-pedo argument we’ve seen so many times already: if you perceive children who are being fucked/raped by adults as the victims of sexual abuse then you are oppressing and objectifying the child.
And she wrote, “So I keep adding this qualification: ‘when incest is a violation,’ suggesting that I think that there may be occasions in which it is not. Why would I talk that way? Well, I do think that there are probably forms of incest that are not necessarily traumatic or which gain their traumatic character by virtue of the consciousness of social shame that they produce.”[3] And there we go again, with the same old pro-pedo notion that it’s not the child rape that is harmful: it’s the social stigma that is harmful.
And to bring it all home, she suggests, along with the other pro-pedo queer theorists and anarchists, that prohibiting parent/child incest is in itself harmful: “It might, then, be necessary to rethink the prohibition on incest as that which sometimes protects against a violation, and sometimes becomes the very instrument of a violation.”[4]
@@Memebrain777 your boy Derrick doesn't understand Judith Butler.
I know that you didn't begin feeling angry about Judith Butler's theories because you were doing reading about incest, so what is your actual problem, and why have you decided to crusade against her with this nonsense?
@@Memebrain777So, Queer theory is when.. No querness is involved? Instead, Queer theory is um, let's see... child abuse?
Actual brainrot of an argument.
@@Memebrain777Derrick hasn’t done you any favours. Read the whole chapter. She’s not saying what you think she’s saying.
The more I try to understand what gender is, the less I understand what it is and what its utility is supposed to be (and this video did not help bring any answers).
I've always been a boy with a feminine temperament and mannerism and am still averse to everything typically male (TV sports, cars, competition, etc.) so I've felt like it was hard for me to fit in during my teens and early adulthood, partly because most people mistake me as being gay but mostly because I had some idea of a mold that I didn't fit in. At some point, I've come to realize that it was not society that held expectations from me but only myself and by completely rejecting the concept of gender, I was finally able to be at ease with who I am because I don't feel the need to define myself or to fit into a mold anymore.
That's why I think that the gender discussion is headed in the wrong direction, we should completely get rid of the concept instead of creating an infinite number of categories that do not mean much anyway. Sex affects our biology, so it's relevant but gender is meaningless and an endless source of confusion.
I completely agree!
dude your just gender non conforming. Nothing worng with it.
Yes! Replace "gender" by "personality" and we are back on our feet.
Well said sir.
I agree with you on gender abolition, but there are many people for whom gender is important and meaningful. I suppose the best path forward here, then, is to allow gender to become split up into more and more sublabels until the meaning and need for such labels becomes obsolete. All this, while at the same time rectifying the gender inequality currently present in our systems.
Regardless, I think the most important part is not to understand gender identity and all the ins and outs of gender theory, but to go into the world with an open mind and respect for others.
I wonder if Gender is actually such a thing, or, if the goal is that each of us can be whatever we want to be, Gender becomes a pointless distinction, and at the end the only thing that's left is just biological sex not assigned to social behavior expectations and standards.
IMO critical theory and intersectionality is just individualism with more steps. But also we have to label everyone and everything.
@@NorthernRealmJackal They are both a set of methods derived from analysis of reactionary movements. Critical Theory has its origins in analyzing Nazism, which in turn was a reactionary movement against Weimar liberalism.
It wasn't the critical theorists who labeled, it was the Nazis who labeled. The critical theorists just tried to find out why and on which grounds the Nazis labeled and then started to deconstruct those labels.
Which is why critical theorists still play a major role in Nazi conspiracy theories to this day.
Intersectionality is the method of working out shared goals between oppressed groups. It's the result of recognizing that oppressions often works systemically and these systems affect several oppressed groups at once.
Gender might indeed become a "pointless distinction" once liberal ideals are fully realized, because in a sense the label only became necessary because oppressed groups were attacked for freely expressing their identity. These attacks lead to the naming of the things that are being attacked.
Hannah Arendt once said that if you are being attacked as a Jew you have to defend yourself as a Jew, not as a Citizen of the World or with reference to human rights.
The freedom liberalism promised means we get to make up the way we live, the things we come up with are not real until we make them.
I think part of the point is, and what separates gender theory from individualism, is that when it comes to gender, you can't simply choose who you are. Yes, to some extent we have free will, but we are also created and limited by the social forces that have made us. When it comes to gender, we don't simply choose to be a man or a woman, or trans, or non-binary, we are formed by the social norms of our society. Most people conform to those norms. But where the is power there is always resistance. Where there are rules, there are always exceptions. Where there are norms, there are always things that subvert those norms. It's not entirely understood how or why people become trans, but what is clear is that they have little choice in the matter. Sometime, for some reason, a person's sense of self attaches to what society tells us the opposite of what they should be. Other times, it subverts society's binary rules completely. Gender does not exist an any objective, material way, but it is certainly real in so far as it constrains and informs how we live our lives, how we think of ourselves, and how we feel and desire.
@@themovingkitchen5238
The same is true for individualism. Prior to the industrial revolution people lived in tighter communities and needed to repress their individualism in order to protect the integrity of the group.
With industrialization people moved to cities, had more privacy and somewhat anonymous relationships with the people around them, which allowed for more individual expression without threatening the integrity of social fabric.
If you ask me, gender is just what happens when you have several generations of liberally socialized people who grew up reproducing pre-liberal social norms less and less with each generation.
We're now around 2-4 generations into that and people start questioning sexual and gender norms.
It is the most obvious development ever. Nobody should be scared by it.
@@themovingkitchen5238 I understand the argument, but the more I think about it, the more it sounds like astrology and religion.
Anyways, I'm happy to live in a society where people can freely be what they want to be.
That title on the thumbnail is enough for a crowd of people to start hollering at each other like savages
Indeed. How can we get along if we can't even withhold our first impressions based on a title alone?
Maybe they are yelling since you are not listening…. 🙉?
Humans are intensely tribalistic and driven by the need to survive.
Our beliefs are part of our survival so when someone challenges our beliefs, they challenge our survival.
Thats why we react emotionally to new ideas.
Reason and rationale is reserved for the familiar.
@@mathiasstrom7790 "gender theory" is a genuinely harmful ideology and being outraged at it is very justified.
I LOVE that Big Think never gives a platform to someone who yells their viewpoint at us and says that anyone that disagrees with them is evil and wrong. They're always measured and rational adults who understand their own viewpoint AS WELL AS THE VIEWPOINT OF THE OTHER SIDE of the issue they're discussing. It brings perspective and understanding to issues I have yet to find in other channels.
Lol then don’t watch
@@ht21 Did you not read my comment or did you think I was being sarcastic? I wasn't being sarcastic, that was a sincere comment.
So? This video explicitly puts you in the bag of the mass murdering SS if you don't accept her drivel. Multiple times she calls arguments against her stupid ideas an attack. Castrating and slaughtering the gullible victims of the plastic genitals industry for profit is called freedom by her. Questioning that is called an attack on democracy by her. How can someone be more malicious?
Judith Butler says that parental incest against children is sometimes not a violation. This is “queer theory.”
Hat tip to Derrick Jensen for compiling the quotes from Butler (and for his commentary in between the Butler quotes).
Here are Butler’s words “queersplaining” why parents raping children is sometimes okay:
In her 2004 book Undoing Gender, she wrote, “It is not necessary to figure parent-child incest as a unilateral impingement on the child by the parent, since whatever impingement takes place will also be registered within the sphere of fantasy. In fact, to understand the violation that incest can be--and also to distinguish between those occasions of incest that are violation and those that are not--it is unnecessary to figure the body of the child exclusively as a surface imposed upon from the outside.”[1] So here she is arguing that sometimes parent-child incest is not a violation.
She also wrote, “The reification of the child’s body as passive surface would thus constitute, at a theoretical level, a further deprivation of the child: the deprivation of psychic life.”[2] This is the same old pro-pedo argument we’ve seen so many times already: if you perceive children who are being fucked/raped by adults as the victims of sexual abuse then you are oppressing and objectifying the child.
And she wrote, “So I keep adding this qualification: ‘when incest is a violation,’ suggesting that I think that there may be occasions in which it is not. Why would I talk that way? Well, I do think that there are probably forms of incest that are not necessarily traumatic or which gain their traumatic character by virtue of the consciousness of social shame that they produce.”[3] And there we go again, with the same old pro-pedo notion that it’s not the child rape that is harmful: it’s the social stigma that is harmful.
And to bring it all home, she suggests, along with the other pro-pedo queer theorists and anarchists, that prohibiting parent/child incest is in itself harmful: “It might, then, be necessary to rethink the prohibition on incest as that which sometimes protects against a violation, and sometimes becomes the very instrument of a violation.”[4]
Big Think is also Woke and forces female representation in their videos in spite of the scientific fact that females are substantially outnumbered by Males in high IQ occupations for purely genetic reasons, meaning that it is appropriate for Males to continue outbumbering Females as science communicators and that their agenda is ridiculous.
Challenging existing ideas is good, but those new ideas must also be open to being challenged.
By challenge you mean 1. The same thing I've heard and already explained a million times like some kind of tour guide simply because people expect a explanation for my existence instead of just letting me live, and these aren't simple short topics, it's like giving a whole lecture 2. Really dumb stuff, like extremely dumb stuff, religious bullshit I don't believe in and that should have nothing to do with me, people who don't believe in individual liberty (even though they might claim to be fans). 3. Asking inappropriate questions about my genitals and how I have sex.
There's a certain point you just need to mind your own business and let people live and practice their own individual liberty, you know?
@@No-ky3kb Atleast they stopped with the "leave the kids alone" bs.
@@frenchfry4017 Fortunately they'll never stop!
@@No-ky3kbI'm a gay atheist and a socialist, and I don't believe in gender. Gender cannot be observed or measured objectively (that's why we're told to ask for pronouns), therefore it is an unproven hypothesis. Butler manipulates and distorts almost everything in her video and she never references any science throughout. Her manipulations and lies have inspired terrible confusion in LGB children, she has given license for males to invade lesbian spaces, she is a lazy philosopher, a fraud, and the imo the worst L to have ever lived. Shame on her for all of the hurt and pain her lies have caused LGB people.
Isn‘t that happening? New ideas always try to propose new ideas to the Status Quo, so to everyone else. So it‘s normal that they get challenged.
The more I learn about it the more gender just sounds like a fancy way of saying sex stereotypes. Doesn’t sound like a legitimate concept at all and more like something offensive and oppressive even. I figure let’s drop the concept and stereotypes and just let people be whoever they want to be just as they are.
You're exactly right and radical feminist critics of Butler agree with you. Gender ideology is based in stereotypes and homophobia. It says that if a boy wants to wear dresses and play with dolls that he must be trans, based on the sex stereotypes of our culture. Effeminate boys often grow up to be gay, or they're just effeminate and that's ok. And there are tomboys. In the real world, we know that most men and women aren't GI Joes and Barbie dolls but have a wide range of interests and presentations. You're a man because you're an adult male or a woman because you're an adult female. That's it. Everything else (wearing makeup, shooting guns) is your personality, interest, hobby, etc. that we may or may not associate with masculine or feminine traits in any given culture.
Yeaaa mannn let’s just let go of social norms and allow potentially predatory and mentally unstable biological men into women only bathrooms, sports and spaces. Live and let live ✌️
Yes, Gender theory is and will continue to just confuse the hell out of kids, as they think they need to choose a gender. People have personalities that make them like certain things, period, and that is allowed and should be accepted in todays world.
But the current state is that trans people arient being told they are accepted for who they are, which is different from who gender ideologists are telling them what sex or gender they could be.
Couldn't have said it better myself
This is how most 'nonbinary' people probably feel. I myself think we should abolish the idea of 'people being more similar to one another than different'
If gender is a social construct then why should I adhere to it? If I want to disregard "gender" and instead only use biological sex why can't I do that?
Perfect! 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
have you ever had sex with a biological human?
money is also a social construct, and we've all tried to find a way out
Social construct means that it's a construct society imposes upon you. You personally might decide to disregard it, but others will still have an idea of what 'gender' you are.
@@torginus Just because the society imposes a social construct doesn't determine whether or not that social construct is valid or correct. I deem it invalid and arbitrary. You can impose it all you want, but myself and the majority of the population refuse to adhere to it.
Without Simone de Beauvoir here to explain her own views, we need to be clear that Butler is presenting Butler’s own interpretation of de Beauvoir’s writings - and that that interpretation is contested and criticised by other philosophers.
Beauvoir was a pedo
Simone de Beauvoir is from mid 20th century. The scientific study of sexuality advanced a lot in these last decades, but Butler ignores it, and thinks she can take ideas about sexuality out of her head (and the heads of other armchair philosophers who also ignore scientific research).
5:16 the most misinterpreted sentence "one is not born a woman, but rather becomes one" basically means the exact opposite this woman is claiming. De Beauvoir is talking about 'the concept/idea' of a woman as a role in society, not an actual woman (an adult human female). The meaning is that the concept 'woman' is accomplished when females play the role society wants them to: wife, mother, beautiful, carer, passive... That's what de Beauvoir is criticising, not affirming. The book is called "the second S EX" for a reason 🤦🏻♀️ because it's about the oppression women suffer because of their s ex, not their gender identity or other made up things.
I'm just leaving the comment in case anyone is interested.
@@4651adri if you qualify gender identity as "made up" then I think you may be the one misinterpreting...
@@4651adri Beauvoir never equated "woman" with just "adult human female". She instead spent 800 or so pages exploring the question of "who is woman, and why is she the other?", and used "woman" and "feminine" often interchangeably - which, to be fair, has also to do with the French language.
AND she was a major existentialist, while gender transition - defining oneself to live authentically - is pretty much the most existentialist thing one can do.
"Be yourself; everyone else is already taken" - Oscar Wilde
Sadly i'm not sure how much longer humanity has on this planet... if we keep yelling at each other over this type of crap (instead of just letting people live their lives and also not trying to force people to be respectful) ... all we have left is our own self to worry about
So i will be ww2 german
Little Edit:,, Be the best Version of yourself.
@@stabroghinvsevolodovici8814 you're romanian, read a book and graduate high school perhaps.
Sex is not assigned at birth; you are born with it, the same way you are born with your eye color, hair color, legs, arms, etc. Therefore, gender has a direct association with biological characteristics, just like people born with light yellow hair are called blond, and people over 1.80m height are called tall, etc. People born with female sex organs are called women, and people with male sex organs are called men.
This doesn't mean that there aren't men who identify as women or women who identify as men, but this is an identity issue. For example, if someone with blond hair dyes their hair to become a brunette, they can believe to be and perceive themselves as a brunette, but in reality, in biology, they are blond.
Have you verified someone's original hair colour before processing the fact of the hair colour you see? If you don't check their original biological hair colour before thinking of them as blonde or brunette or whatever, then you are judging them off their appearance. Thatms the point, gender is a societal performance.
@@spectremodtrain5936 "Have you verified someone's original hair colour before processing the fact of the hair colour you see?" Yes, it's an objective hair colour, there is no judgement involved, it is a fact, it can be checked with a Colorimeter. The color of the hair is not a social construct, it is objective, it has to do with how light reflects off the hair. We humans assign a name to that "reflection". Gender is not a social construct either, sex and gender are tied to biology. This can be checked with a DNA test. It is totally independent of how people perceive themselves.
@@oresteluci My question is whether you personally use a colorimeter on people's heads when you meet them, and when you classify their image and deploy it into your consciousness. The answer is most likely no. It would be unnecessary and totally anal to do so. Scientifically you don't classify people by measuring wavelengths and objective facts - you know i have a face because you feel I have two eyes, a nose and a mouth.
In the end the societal performance of hair colour is the part we should deal with, evidently, if discussing social issues. If a person got drunk and began giving money to any blonde person they saw on their street the most important matter would be the people performing this blondeness.
When it comes to gender you are this same drunk person even sober. You assign and behave and communicate socially according to the societal performanc ethat is gender whether you object to how unscientific it is or not.
@@spectremodtrain5936 We are talking about different things: perceptions versus reality. People can be perceived and interpreted in as many ways as there are humans; however, this doesn't alter the fact of reality. I do not know if a person is naturally blond or not when I see them, but that doesn't take away the fact of their real natural hair colour. A woman can dress as a man, act as a man, have surgery, and be indistinguishable from a man at first glance. But in biology, they have a woman's DNA, and this cannot be changed. That's why we have a special classification for them; "Transgender". We need a term to differentiate them from biological men and women. Otherwise, why would we need such a terminology?
Don't get me wrong; I have nothing against transgender people. People can do whatever they want and perceive themselves however they wish if it makes them happy. What I don't agree with is forcing the ideology that gender is a social construct because it is not, it is based on biology.
@spectremodtrain5936 in 99% of cases you either have a dick or a vagina, to which a clear classification will follow
"Sex you become". What does this mean?
😂
That is actually a great question. "Becoming" is a very philosophical verb about the nature of nature itself...
She's specifically referring to simone's philosophy around the early conception of the difference between the biological objectivity of the body and the aocial construction around and about that object
@@imiguifurr Quit conflating gender/sex with personality traits and temperament and gender roles, as though they're synonymous. They're Not.
All men are born male, all females are born female and there are exactly ZERO exceptions. Neither are social constructs, feelings, fetishes or costumes.
Your DNA literally organizes your physical body.
DNA dictates the production of objective biological differences between males and females. 100% of the population is either male or female, even intersex people. If they have a Y chromosome, they are heterogametic and male. If not, they are homogametic and female. But you knew that because you've actually educated yourself on these conditions, right?
Personality traits and temperament (Neither of which is gender exclusive -- hence effeminate males, butch females and tomboys), aren't synonymous with gender or gender roles.
There is no internal feeling that is exclusive to men or women (or boys/girls), what makes anyone a man or a woman is being either male or female and reaching adulthood. Their sex and stage of physical maturity makes them men or women, not some "feeling" they have.
Believing there is some "essence" specific to males or female as far as feelings go, that can manifest "in the wrong body", is akin to a religious belief, having faith in something that is impossible to prove or disprove. The thing is though, that no one on the "trans" side can actually even explain what this "essence" is, they can't even explain it to themselves yet have convinced themselves that the feeling they have means they "are in the wrong body" - without realizing that their discomfort simply stems from not realizing that they view conforming to sexist stereotypes as legitimate measures of manhood or womanhood. That is why every explanation given of WHY a male "can't be a man, but is instead woman" etc. relies upon listing stereotypical stuff, or, in some cases is completely abstract and refuses to actually provide any explanation of what they mean, simply stating they "know" that what they feel means what they say it does, even though they can't actually provide a definition of it. "It's hard to explain but I know I'm right" is an attitude one constantly comes up against - a religious faith in something they can't define.
This idea that the terms "man" and "woman" carry all this baggage, sexist stereotypes, that people need to live up to or feel comfortable with is a complete fabrication coming from the "trans" side. You lot want a term to reflect aspects of your personality as well, you want to create more boxes to put people in, as you won't accept simply just being a man or a woman based on being born male or female (and reaching adulthood, obviously people are boys and girls before becoming men or women), but believe you need this "freedom of expression" to broadcast what sexist stereotypes you feel more comfortable with - thinking the world needs to adopt the sexist view you lot have (you fail to see just how much you have in common with Conservatives).
Replacing objective definitions which are based in physical reality, with entirely subjective metaphysical claims, is not logical in any way, is not morally superior, and is demonstrably harmful, not least to female rights and protections, but also to practically anyone that buys into it as it warps people's perception of the underlying issues. It hinders people in their quest for individuation, creating this false narrative of them becoming more "authentic" when the total opposite is true, they believe they need validation from others in order to be happy etc. instead of being encouraged to find more inner strength and resilience with less reliance on how people see them. Demanding to be legally recognized as the opposite sex of what one is, is in no way shape or form more authentic than accepting the physical reality one is born into.
To believe we as individuals can have 100% control over our identity in society, what we are seen as by others, in interaction with, and in relation to, society/the world/physical existence is a fool's errand, it is a delusional understanding of reality and existence.
Interestingly, before this prominent movement came into the spotlight, I often used to hear discussions about the unique qualities of women and men within the context of relationships. Some men stated that they couldn't perceive certain women as women, and I have also encountered women expressing similar sentiments. While watching this, it reminded me of these previous conversations, and I realized that the traditional understanding of gender/sex can involve ambiguous sexualization.
Holy shit, I forgot that could happen
It does not stand to reason that ambiguity in personality types automatically results in the acceptance of the philosophies being espoused by this professor.
Judith Butler says that parental incest against children is sometimes not a violation. This is “queer theory.”
Hat tip to Derrick Jensen for compiling the quotes from Butler (and for his commentary in between the Butler quotes).
Here are Butler’s words “queersplaining” why parents raping children is sometimes okay:
In her 2004 book Undoing Gender, she wrote, “It is not necessary to figure parent-child incest as a unilateral impingement on the child by the parent, since whatever impingement takes place will also be registered within the sphere of fantasy. In fact, to understand the violation that incest can be--and also to distinguish between those occasions of incest that are violation and those that are not--it is unnecessary to figure the body of the child exclusively as a surface imposed upon from the outside.”[1] So here she is arguing that sometimes parent-child incest is not a violation.
She also wrote, “The reification of the child’s body as passive surface would thus constitute, at a theoretical level, a further deprivation of the child: the deprivation of psychic life.”[2] This is the same old pro-pedo argument we’ve seen so many times already: if you perceive children who are being fucked/raped by adults as the victims of sexual abuse then you are oppressing and objectifying the child.
And she wrote, “So I keep adding this qualification: ‘when incest is a violation,’ suggesting that I think that there may be occasions in which it is not. Why would I talk that way? Well, I do think that there are probably forms of incest that are not necessarily traumatic or which gain their traumatic character by virtue of the consciousness of social shame that they produce.”[3] And there we go again, with the same old pro-pedo notion that it’s not the child rape that is harmful: it’s the social stigma that is harmful.
And to bring it all home, she suggests, along with the other pro-pedo queer theorists and anarchists, that prohibiting parent/child incest is in itself harmful: “It might, then, be necessary to rethink the prohibition on incest as that which sometimes protects against a violation, and sometimes becomes the very instrument of a violation.”[4]
@@Memebrain777 This lady, man, or whatever, is among the least intelligent people ever employed by a university.
Right because there’s masculine women and feminine men. But a feminine man is still a man and still will have some masculine traits and behaviors that will never change. It doesn’t matter what society does or if they were told they were a girl from day one and were treated like a girl their whole life. It’s happened. One of the gender theory founders (who was a sick pedophile child abuser) did a study where he did a sex change on an infant boy and his family lied to him and told him he was a girl. But he still had male traits. He was still miserable being confused thinking he was a girl when he was a boy the whole time. He ended up lol himself. Gender definitely isn’t a social construct. Have children and you’ll see it. With little babies and the way women and men act around children. This whole theory is a lie made up by a pedophile. Pedophiles are pushing it on children. It’s disgusting and wrong.
Titling this as ‘Berkley professor’ is really underestimating the influence of Judith Butler 😅
Literally! lol she has had such a big influence.
Yeah more like Queer and Gender Studies Pioneer or something
A very influential scientific denier.
@joaodecarvalho7012 I believe she is in fact a scientist, is she not? Like literally that's what studying gender from an academic perspective is about. But what do you think?
@@brianhunt4164 No, she does not do scientific research on sexuality, and she explicitly says that she is not interested in what science has to say about the subject. Her references are philosophers from decades ago, such as Simone de Beauvoir and Foucault.
She also politicizes her “theory”, turning it into on anti-establishment protest or something.
The concept of gender makes a lot more sesne when you completely decouple it from sex and instead use the word "personality".
Yep. They should leave sex alone. But they can't and won't.
@williammkydde whose they? Or are you just gesturing at an imaginary boogy man.
@@panopticon7883 You know, you're part of it. I don't have to explain obvious things.
@williammkydde it's not obvious, I'm genuinely curious, please explain.
@@panopticon7883 Do you call our governments "boogy man"? Are you a human?
Sex has to do with a set of biological attributes, such as our chromosomes, reproductive and sexual anatomy, hormone functions, etc.
❤
Gender is also connected to this. As is the word gene, and the word genetics. The 'gen' part of the word comes from the ancient greek word for birth, 'genesis'.
Human sex is a social construct that classifies certain physiological features human bodies tend to have into 2-3 boxes (3 depending on your view on intersexuality). Different societies and cultures have had different understandings and definitions of sex, it often varies from medical professional to medical professional!
Human sex itself serves to enforce the binary structures we try to break and feeds into the essentialization of our bodies.
@@Phiwipussu are an idiot 💀
@@Phiwipuss Men and women are more alike than they are different, but it is anti-science to claim that men and women are the same, and only have differences created by society.
Wouldn't it be more progressive to admit our differences as sexes, than to pretend that those differences are all a lie created by a great cultural conspiracy?
I love philosophy. Enjoyed the exposure. There are always questions remaining. I will not get into arguments, since we won't be able to solve them in such a short time, but I totally agree that the congruence and clarification of the main concepts (especially of justice, freedom, rights and respect, for instance) are important and may be the beginning of impartial conversations.
This is anything but philosophy!
@@JaysonT1 what do you mean?
"Philosophy"? This is just ideology. Make no mistake.
@@mallorga1965indeed tis no philosophy to be found here
the ideology was upgraded to "cult" status somewhere between 2017 and 2020, it's now 2023 and the philosophers have finally arrived to let you know, this definitely isn't a philosophy
FYI women have wombs, the clue was in the name this whole time,
Man + Womb = Woman
I think one of the most important things I've learned about myself is that I have the power to decide who I am independent of what society thinks I should be.
We are all the same. I just happen to be born in a male human. I emerged from this human just as you and everyone else did.
We should all strive to have self empowerment without having power over others.
It's called personality - gender has come to be called that by fools who want to be something special just because of their personality.
You do not have the power to decide 'who you are', if 'who you are' refers to your fundamental construction. You can choose your personality, the qualities you choose to reinforce, even behavior. But who you are is a matter of fact, and not a matter of your personal aspirations.
@@burgerbobbelcher No. you cant - you are born either a boy, or a girl.
That's why we recognize them as boys and girls.
You cant apply your stupid fairy tale on the facts.
@Matt But do you really? Can you really emancipate yourself from physical reality? Can you be suddenly less tall? Have a different hair Color or be an animal? Or be less old?
Now a gender feminist would say that woman and men are only different with their sexual organs. For a social constructionist everything is a social construct. But is that really true? Actually we know it is not true. Research is very clear on that. Doesn’t mean we are born very differently or that society has no influence but there are such things are inherent differences. Why are there two genders if they are by default entirely the same?
@@burgerbobbelcher What a well articulated opinion.
Why would someone dismantle strict definitions only to subscribe to another strict definition? I’m inclined to think that they believe greater happiness would be gained in the defection along with greater ease in one way or another. It’s a risky gamble to venture into the unknown and make a permanent choice to solve a problem that may be temporary. One may find equal or less ease. Expansion of the definition or creation of a new term altogether seems the more beneficial strategy.
You just spoke straight facts. This is what happens when you remove God from the equation @@flachrattenmann
A very interesting speaker. There's a lot of angry content on this site against the words 'gender', 'woke' and 'feminism'. It's very easy to get caught up in it all. Professor Butler spoke with only reason and common sense. No anger, just an invitation to re-think the way we see each other and the world around us. I think that there's a lot of fear amongst people regarding gender and roles in society, and a strange focus on male athletes competing in women's competitions, and it's sad that this kind of subject is the focus, when it really doesn't affect most people's lives. There's a much more fundamental point here about choice and freedom.
I have read the section of her book that the professor, Amy Jemgochian whom I love from the UC Berkeley gave out in my class at the art institute. I never thought she is this young. I liked her writing and was helpful to read it.
Kathleen Stock & Judith Butler NEED to have a debate.
These ppl dont want debates...and this is why we just watched a video where she is alone spitting nonsensicals unchallenged...
Id prefer Helen Joyce vs BUtler. Joyce is a much better debater than Kathleen Stock
surely she can just respond to Butler’s texts? If gender performativity is wrong, you can show that in writing without needing a “gotcha” moment no? it’s what every other respected academic does
@@dimercamparini cause debates rarely bring out the truth. Most people just wanna "win" debates and not genuinely try to have a discussion and add to the knowledge base. Its mostly a fancy dck measuring contest rooted in tribalism nowadays. It seems you also fall into that category.
@@itsbenbitch14
It was proven completely wrong by its inventor - Dr John Money.
Look up his experiment with twins.
His appalling experiment proved his theory of gender (which he had invented) to be completely wrong - yet he claimed success and his deeply traumatised victims had to expose themselves in public in a deeply intimate way in order to let the world know he was lying.
They both went on to kill themselves.
This is the foundation of all gender theory and now trans-ideology - deeply, murderously sociopathic and toxic right from the start.
Yet lawgivers are trying to impose this on the public?!?
WTF is going on?
Trans ideology - and its nonsensical notion of self-identification - has nothing to do with the rights of Trans people to identify as hey please - The ideology is about forcing someone's by-definition unverifiable statements about their by-definition unverifiable subjective feelings onto others even when in defiance of the very evidence ofvtheir senses.
That is unspeakably grotesque forced-faith with which only the weak-minded could comply
Sex is not an "assignment". There is not some cosmic administrator assigning babies a sex.
He/she is not cosmic he/she exists. If you are a father you probably met him/her in the adminstrative establishment where the "birth certificate" (or equivalent term) was registered. This day you assigned your child a sex, a first name, a date and so on.
BTW Trump agrees:
Ex-US President speech on "left-wing gender insanity" The January 31, 2023
"... establishing the only genders recognized by The United States Government are male and female and they are assigned at birth..."
Yes there is lol,
You have a penis or a uterus,
How do you think a baby human is made,
Oh I forgot to ask what type of stork delivers the baby,
Is there a bird in leather,
If that the case I'm sccaran
There is a doctor, who puts the assigned sex on a birth certificate, which has to be certified by a county govt office. So yes, everyone is assigned a sex at birth.
@@down-to-earth-mystery-school oh I was thinking tv show farscape
Mr Happy is crystal clear about gender identity
Does anyone else find that an epic soundtrack playing at the same volume as someone speaking not only makes it harder to pay attention to what she's actually saying but also maybe changes the message of the video a little bit? It's like the speaker is being put up on a pedestal in a god-like fashion, as if to motivate an army to fight. I can only speculate but couldn't this amplify the degree to which people hear her words as emotionally charged and kind of motivate them to dig in their heels whether they agree or not?
I'll go one better: I wish they took out all the b-roll protest footage too. I know we have to appeal to dwindling attention spans, but I wish they could have just put the camera on her and left it there. Everything else feels emotionally manipulative.
Very interesting observations! I agree, it all feels very emotional manipulative.
sadly, yes :/
Great observation! Thanks!
Goebbels would have loved this era we are in. All this potential to propaganda! I Bet we would see a lot of Hitler's discourses with environmental epic music.
Goebbels believed that music could create a public emotional and spiritual experience competitive with religion. Concert halls with their darkened auditoriums and formal settings exposed the audience to an experience similar of going to church. The music of Wagner was the centerpiece of the new "Aryan" spirituality, aiming to attain the same "impact generated by traditional Christian religious ecstasy and devotion".
Not to say she is anything like Hitler! Of course I don't belive that.
@mathiasrennochaves3533 I can certainly see the value of invoking historical context here. I'm told history does tend to repeat itself if we don't understand and remember it. I can even appreciate a little bit that you'd want to muse about hypothetical scenarios of what Nazis would be doing today. We are certainly living in a world where individual actors and organizations with significant resources are trying to influence what we think and feel. I wonder though - genuinely - if maybe you could clarify and elaborate on what you think about this video - maybe even how you feel when you watch it or listen to it? I find it hard to tell if your final comments are authentic or tongue-in-cheek.
The foundation of gender theory: Separate out sex and gender as two different things, and then conflate them again as it suits you.
Yep
Brutal but, you're right.
Ding ding ding
@user-kd7qu5hj5q Correct. Gender norms or gender expectations are absolutely a construct to a degree, yes. And yes, that is certainly limiting to women who aren't particularly feminine or men that aren't particularly masculine. And I feel for them!
However, when society at large conflates gender and sex as the same thing by stating, for example, "You're not a real man because you like pink" or, "You're not a real woman because you're a tomboy" they don't mean it LITERALLY. The most conservative person on earth doesn't actually believe these gendered stereotypes are what makes one a literal woman or a literal man. It's simply metaphorical. (Sexist and unfair, yes, but not literal!)
The problem with gender ideology is when activists proclaim, "Trans women are women" they mean it quite literally. They mean this to be a biological reality, when in fact, it is only an ideological reality. You can't simply speak whatever you like into existence, as Butler naively asserts, and have it be true. I can't say, "I'm 15" and have it be true if I'm actually 26.
Likewise, a gender nonconforming man can't say, "I am a woman" and poof! Suddenly it's true! Perhaps he might be relatively passable depending on how far along his transition he is, but he's still not literally a woman. In the same way I'm not literally 15, even if look 15, he's not literally a woman just because he passes as one.
And for the most part, the question of "passability" isn't important anyway. If a man wants to present as the opposite sex in a public space, let's say, like a Starbucks, it doesn't really matter whether or not we take him at his word when he says he's a woman... and it would be quite impolite, and maybe even cruel to point it out to him. After all, he should have the right to live however he likes. I have no problem using preferred pronouns in contexts such as this.
However, the fundamental truth of biological reality becomes distinctly clear when, for example, a man asserts he is literally a woman, no different from a natal female, and demands access to intimate female spaces like changing rooms, women's shelters and women's prisons. There have already been many reported cases of trans woman absolutely dominating cis woman in sports, and even more horrifying, reported cases of female inmates being sexually assaulted by self purported trans women in female prisons. The lack of safeguarding in the name of an ideology is already genuinely harming women.
My stance on this is fairly simple: "Your Liberty To Swing Your Fist Ends Just Where My Nose Begins". One has the right to perceive and present themselves however one chooses. However they should not have the right to impose that perception onto others and they should not have the right to access intimate female spaces when it is quite obvious the person in question is biologically male. To pretend one doesn't notice otherwise is simply a PC move in this strange "Emperor's New Clothes" era where we are being gaslit in real time. And it's all at the expense of women and girls.
Fundamentally, the problems and arguments lie in the distinction between Sex and Gender. The vocabulary we use to define Male and female sex and gender is the same, and so there lies the confusion on both sides, even in the lgbt community itself. We should not deny the existence of Biological and Psychological differences, nor should we think that they are the same thing. I think in order for different sides to agree is to acknowledge the existence of Sex and Gender and not try to treat it as some religion that can be left to one's own beliefs.
I can almost agree with what u said, but the problem relies on how broad gender actually is. Gender is an identity and people identify as whatever the hell they want.
I don't have problem saying that a trans woman is a woman or that a trans man is a man, but I will never believe in what you identify if you're out of one of these 2 gender (Man and woman).
And that's where things starts to get messy. Gender Ideology believers like to say that people should treat them by their right pronouns, but a lot of them don't even have a gender to begin with/transitions gender every second. And if you refuse to call that weird guy as deer/deerself (? XD It exists, there is a Twitch user called Ferocious that identifies himself as a deer) because... well, you can't be gender deer, it doesn't exist (You're a human being, to begin with) these gender freaks will do everything they can to destroy your life.
That's actually the only real problem with all of this gender ideology thing that a 100% agree. Non binaries doesn't exist and forcing people to deny science to accept someone else's identity is the definition of dictatorship.
@@pedrovitor5324 the thing is, we have terms already available to describe them. A trans man is exactly what the term states as with trans woman. You don't need to change your beliefs about who should be called what. Once the politicization of this issue dies down we'll forget about each other's genitalia and get back to hating everything else about each other.
So you have your own theory about gender, just like Judith said. Cool!
@@pedrovitor5324 "these gender freaks will do everything they can to destroy your life" is all I need to know about you........ It's not your life that is being destroyed. You talk about dictatorship, yet your words are fascist.
Maybe take a closer look at yourself, and what's in your own heart.
Gender is a believe system. It’s what I and only I believe what suits me the best. It’s unfalsifiable. Recognizing that is very important in this debate. If we can live for thousands of years with religion, I don’t see any reason why can’t find a way to accept it in our society.
Berkeley saying „[] assigned at birth“ is sad to me. Deeply.
What's the point of gender? Why is it so important to define and put someone in a box, if it's a spectrum and everyone is different? Why did we have to complicate our lives? As a gay man that identifies as a gay man, I'm ashamed of this ideas.
This nonsense all comes from pedophiles and those who identify with them.
Its not important... men are free to be as masculine or feminine as they want... the problem arises when just because the are feminine they pretend that makes them a woman... a male who call himself a woman doenst make him a woman, it just makes him a liar.
Gender evolved over billions of years for the purpose of reproduction. Male attracts female and they copulate and have children. But there are many diseases in nature and some things in nature don't work as nature designed them to work. Everything in the human body has some type of disease attached to it. Some people are born male and some people are born female and there is no doubt about their gender. But some people are born with a diseased gender i.e. a male that feels female and a female that feels male. Diseases are a part of life and medicine is yet to get a handle on the vast array of diseases that affect us humans.
I think the very essence of this is the description of it. If you do not describe it yourself. Someone else will do it for you in a way that you are not truly in to it. (Over a year yeah. I just watched the video and read your comment 😊)
“The sex you’re assigned” vs “The sex you become” needed more context, because I was onboard the sex ≠ gender train but when you dropped that one without additional context, you lost me, I’m sorry.
well she was reciting simone de beauvoir there. don't know why that would be an issue.
@@eanji36 because…you can’t…change…your sex. gender? yes. sex? uh…yea, nope, negative.
@@astrovicis you don't have to shout so loud about your Dunning-Kruger syndrome. just stick to talking about concepts you can grasp.
@@rufusdashiell2706 You could also enlighten me if you have a working definition for non-biologically-informed sex in addition to whatever term we’re now using to refer to XX vs. XY chromosomes instead of slapping me with a sophisticated insult devoid of actual information.
@@rufusdashiell2706 Rufus seems peeved and needs a time out.
The term gender was created to be used interchangeably w sex since the word sex has two different meanings. It's to help people communicate more clearly which is what language is for but it can also be used as a weapon to vilify people, control how they think, or just confuse the shit out of them. My take is that people conflate gender with gender expression or personality. This theory seems to be built on stereotypes, you're saying if someone is gender nonconforming they aren't actually that gender. I also disagree w treating someone differently based on skin color, sex or any other immutable characteristics
It's come out that pervert doctors and degenerative actors with a really sick fetish are mainly responsible followed by a wave of online pedophiles whispering in their ears of neglected youth,
More and more people are coming out.
Happy Straight Modesty Month by the way.
Exactly! Bravo. One sane and intelligent comment on this very unfortunate list of naive and “philosophy wise” ignorant comments.
@@luizalouyoga happy 11 months of straight modesty to you too fellow internet person.
@@PostalFerretWithRum Cheers, mate 🍻
Let's also not forget that if "gender is a social construct" then it is society that says what gender you are. You don't get to pick one yourself.
"The body is not a fact"? The fact that someone who is so well educated on the subject is making such glaring reification errors is continued problem with conversations on gender.
She was quoting a philosopher, that in itself tells you that she probably wasn't speaking literally.
@@callumarcher8111the body remains a crucial component and critical reality that cannot be reduced to a “social construct”
@@andretorres8452 I think you vastly underestimate how non-literal philosophers can be
@@callumarcher8111Philosophers who touch on biological topics such as biological sex, are overstepping their boundaries outside their area of expertise.
People should be allowed to live as they choose to live as long as it doesnt cause harm to someone else. That is true freedom.
Seeing a dude parade around as a woman DOES cause harm in society. It should be illegal.
And people should not force their worldview on other people and their kids. This is true freedom
@@yusakuzgun2824 but you can force your worldview? and think that this world belongs only to people like you? understand that nobody is forcing you to do shit, you are only mad that lgbtq+ people are more free to live their life, have representation in the media and have a voice. You are free to go live in the woods with your children and isolate them from everytign. But stop being egocentric and think that the world evolves around you because it doesn't.
well true freedom doesn't exist because we're living in a society, so all decision you make for your life can be harmful to someone else indeed.
The true freedom is a lie and cannot be taken seriously. Find a fact that might help your argument.
@@yusakuzgun2824 well the problem is that usually the mere existence and presence of the “other” like e.g. a trans-person, is considered to be forcing your worldview onto others
Lots of food for thought in here. I like that she brings up the language and how it shapes thought. I've been thinking for some time that part of the confusion around gender is caused by the deep connection that the word "gender" has to biological indicators - genes, sex organs, hormones. We need a separate word or even several words to delineate behavioral gender, emotional gender, psychological gender - CHOSEN gender.
Using the same word for the part you have no control over and the part you have complete control over makes no sense.
Fully agree. Personality(includes interests and temperament) is a better term, and already exists. Gender is just redundant in what it brings to the world as it risks confusing people as it’s deifinition is not agreed upon, and what it tries to refer to are better explained by either sex or personality
@@alexross2835 I was also just going to say ... Sounds like personality to me
@@notmyrealpseudonym6702 Biology is inextricably linked to personality. We are not all of the same mind, but none of us could have a mind without a brain.
Judith has a brilliant take on this. Protect her at all costs
@@SF2036 and yet each one of use is biologically COMPLETELY UNIQUE. Even identical twins diverge through environmental factors and how they impact the body. To pretend that 8 BILLION unique sets of chromosomes - combined with 8 BILLION different life experiences can only result in two gender related dispositions and that those genders MUST correlate to ONE HALF of one chromosome pair... well that's just completely absurd.
content warning: shower thoughts, but is the answer to dysphoria really to encourage people to change everything about their body? like even if it is safe and effective, gender is STILL societally bound by sex in most places. rather than fighting and trying to streamline highly subjective concepts that differ from culture to culture, isn't it more important to realize and tell younger people that neither sex NOR gender/pronouns/voice/body type define us and make the best of what we have? instead of trying to define our gender, should we try to stop gender from defining us?
maybe it's not the answer. Maybe people are right when they say that changing the body you have through hormones/surgery/etc so that you can go from one box to another is ultimately futile for some people. Maybe the push to liberate people from discrimination on the basis of sex and gender, when done wrong, makes some people feel like, oxymoronically, their right to define themselves is being taken away- and no matter how far that strays from the original movement, that feeling is valid. But I don't actually think that "people should have the right to change their bodies" and "we should stop gender from defining us" are contradictory statements. I don't think transgender liberation involves trying to "streamline highly subjective concepts", nor do I think most trans people want to.
I'm transgender. I have dysphoria. I'm not sure about medically transitioning yet, but I have gone by a different name, used a bunch of pronouns other than the ones I was socialized with, and shrugged at so, so many different people asking me what my gender was and how I knew. I don't know what my gender is!
And what I've found, in both trans and cis people, is even when people are very confident in what gender they are, if you ask the average person what makes them a woman, or a man, or a bunch of other things, and what makes them sure- they'll get a little foggy eyed, and you'll get a bunch of different answers.
Your very conservative grandmother might tell you it's because she was born a woman, and she's never had a problem with being one. Your transgender schoolmate might tell you it's because he always wanted to go through male puberty, and when he didn't, he knew there was something wrong with him. Your cisgender uncle might confess that, although he's never felt the need to be traditionally masculine, he has always felt like a man- and although others might not have understood that distinction, he knew it didn't really matter. Your genderfluid cousin might tell you it's because xe likes wearing flowery dresses and suits, likes being Mr. and Ms., and likes being pretty and handsome, and when people tried to force xim into one category, xe disavowed all unchanging labels.
the fact is that it's very difficult to stop gender from defining you when *so* many things in society do that for you- from primary school lunch tables to sleepovers, from school sports to locker rooms to public showers, from clothing shopping to period pad packaging to advertisements what your sister and brother get for birthday presents, nearly everything you will do in life comes with the connotations of male vs. female, boys vs. girls, pink vs. blue, and somewhere in there, whatever the hell is going on with the boy moms of tiktok.
That's fine for some people. a lot of people won't notice, or they'll take it as the way life needs to be in intelligent societies. But others might take issue with that binary. whether it is because they want to sit with the boys and the girls at lunch, or because they feel like those systems are used to oppress women, or because they don't think they were given the manual to those rules, or because they want in on the other side, there are always going to be some people who are very uncomfortable with being told, "this is how your life needs to be, and everyone else is fine doing what they need to do". And, like I've already said, even if it seems like a mere sliver of the larger population, those feelings deserve to be heard. What you're describing isn't impossible- I think it's a good goal! I think a lot people would benefit from knowing that their gender/pronouns/voice/body type don't need to define their lives. But it's very hard to constantly have that other voice telling them that gender is a fact, sex is a fact, body type is a fact, and any and all discomfort with the cards you were dealt makes you stupid and sick. Maybe in a utopian society, gender/pronouns/voice/body type wouldn't define the way you were treated in a society at all, but they do, and since we're social creatures, that does define a big part of your life (unless you live alone in a cave underground, which, with the way things are going right now on the surface, can't blame ya).
I think you're right when you say that we should make the best of what we have, but I also think that sometimes, making the best of what we have involves shaking things up a little. A man, trans or cis with a very high voice shouldn't feel like he needs to change his voice to be accepted as a man, but what if he's talked to his therapist and wants to start voice training so that he's treated better? Is that okay? If it is, is that only because he's been assessed by a medical professional? is it okay if he's cis but not if he's trans? if it's not, why? Is trying to change this aspect of his body a way of avoiding addressing his negative self image, or will it help? Should he suck his discomfort up and deal with it to inspire all the other high-voiced men out there?
I ask these questions honestly because like I've already said, I don't have all the answers, and I don't pretend I do. These are things that I debate, both with myself and others. Is the right to change yourself the same as the right to self expression? Are those rights inalienable? Does a random lawmaker you've never met who lives ten hours away from you have the right to tell you what parts of yourself you should love, and which ones you should hate?
I think people change themselves all the time, both temporarily and permanently. I dye my hair purple every winter because I get bad seasonal depression, and the bright colors make me feel happy. People may start going to therapy because they want a more positive outlook on life. Actors put on costumes, makeup, and even elaborate prosthetics to look like what they strive to imitate. People have their last name legally changed to reflect the relationships they have with the people they love. People have their badly damaged limbs amputated because they don't want intensive, painful restorative surgeries. Cisgender women have their breast size reduced because of back pain, or enlarged because they feel that makes them more feminine. And, most critically to the whole international discussion, transgender (and cisgender!) people use different pronouns than the ones they were expected to, change their names, go on hormones or hormone blockers, and get surgery that chances the shape of their body. All of these experiences are different because we're all different, and we change as a more natural part of life than this whole idea of "gender" ever was. those changes might be difficult. The reactions of the people we care about might hurt. But doesn't it matter if someone wants them, and if it changes an important part of the unique life they live for the better?
I don't think transgender liberation comes at the cost of freedom to live the life you want. Humans aren't a set of preset options for gender/pronouns/voice/body type, and I don't think anyone genuinely believes that. I think some people are scared of change- if a transgender woman faces misogyny on the basis of her gender expression, what does that mean for the cisgender woman who always viewed discrimination on the basis of sex?
If we broaden and increase these categories and allow people to choose how they express, why they express that way, and what they view themselves internally, that might be scary for some people. And that's okay. It really is. But no one is forcing your children, your friends, or you to act a certain way because of trans liberation. We want you to live your life on your terms, just as we wish people would calm down about the conspiracies they read on Facebook and let us live ours.
sorry for leaving an essay length reply on your comment, random internet stranger. I probably misspelled some things, could have worded others better, and I'm definitely missing some important stuff (aren't we all?). But, yeah. Just wanted to put that out there for your enjoyment, criticisms, and discussion, however you feel about it.
The reason doctors recommend trans affirming care is because it's been shown to be extremely effective. The mental health issues in the trans community are well known and in particular the suicide rate being 10x higher than the general population. Trans folk that go through the whole protocol - therapy, then puberty blockers, then HRT, then surgery (when they're adults) by contrast actually have better mental health than the general population.
It being safe and effective isn't something to brush aside when the treatment saves lives. Having a more tolerant society is also needed but this isn't an either/or imo
When they said "bodies can be more free to breathe, to move, to love" -- my mind immediately went to chest binders and I was like... that ain't breathing better or moving better.
@@im2randomghghthat is a lie. There are not long term studies of hormone replacement effects, or surgeries, etc, mainly because they are experimental stuff.
You can give your opinion, but do not lie, that's wrong
@@TheScaredLittleScholar omg this is the most detailed, logical and empathetic description I have seen about this topic. I really want to thank you for writing this in such a lucid way. In fact, it's probably the best youtube comment I've ever read :) I am cis-gendered but this helps me understand trans people and our society so much better and helps me be a better ally and a better person.
its amazing that the cambridge dictionary uses the word woman to define woman... thats themoment where you realize that we are fked up
Circular definition.
@andretorres8452
Me: what is a cat mr cambridge university dictionary?
Mr Cambridge dictionary: Don't you know? Duh... A cat is a cat 💁🏽♀️💅🏽
🙄
Sex is observed in the womb. You cannot change sex. You can identify what you want to be as long it doesn’t impinge on the rights of others.
Sex is not “assigned” at birth. It is observed and noted. It is determined at fertilization. Live anyway you want, but don’t tell me biology is subject to your feelings.
Not exactly. Fetuses start off with the same genitalia ("female") and then hormonal environment allows the genitalia to masculinize or feminize. This is why biological women with XY chromosomes and biological men with XX chromosomes exist. Then you have the condition guevedoces, where a infant is born with a vagina and then grows a penis at puberty due to there not having been enough DHT in utero. Trans men's clitorises likewise masculinize on testosterone - they essentially start growing a penis, which have been known to get up to 4.5 inches - even outside of the critical periods of puberty and in utero. Sex is in a way largely a state of biology rather than a binary immutable fact per se. For all your "facts don't care about your feelings" crowing, the fact is that the scientific consensus simply doesn't agree with you on this, in fact I encourage you to ask endocrinologists or other biological scientists about this. There's a reason that refrain is ironically way more likely to come from Christians than atheists.
The background music on this is really distracting being at roughly the same volume as the narrative. This might not be a good listen for folks with sensory processing differences.
Disingenuous is too kind a word to describe Butler’s linguistic sleight of hand in deliberately conflating sex and gender from the first statement that sex is assigned at birth to the way she hitches her gender wagon to so many other social issues. The heartbreaking damage done to biological heterosexual and lesbian women and girls is made even morally reprehensible by her glibness.
Sex isn’t “assigned at birth.” It is determined at conception and observed at birth, if not earlier by sonograms. It’s utterly unscientific to use the phrase “assigned at birth,” and the phrase is nothing more than Orwellian.
It's just common parlance. Chill your pants.
@@sohu86x I will not “chill my pants!” It’s only become “common practice” in the last few years because Leftist Loons have attempted to change the language. We don’t have to acquiesce to anti-science language manipulation. In fact, we should resist it at every opportunity.
What is problematic to me in discussions about gender is how to evaluate the respective weight given to a) my personal and subjective definition of "my" gender and b) gender as a social construct. That is, in this area, how much do I get to proclaim my own gender? Is 100% personal freedom/power in this realm what I/we want? What balance is there between what I think and feel...and the communities that I participate in? Is it okay for me to lay down my own internal and subjective truth and learn from those around me? When am I being oppressed...when am I being helpfully challenged? Is it ever okay for me to sacrifice some part of my individual identity in order to help or love the persons that I share community with?
From an anthropological view I don't think it's really possible to 100% define ourselves. We ARE influenced by the communities around us, both small ones and large ones. If we feel accepted and participate in a heterosexual community, that community will influence how we engender ourselves. If we feel accepted and participate in a queer community, that community will influence how we engender ourselves. (And, of course, the reverse is true...i.e. when we don't feel accepted in a community...that affects how we engender ourselves too.)
I sense that much of how we define our identity, gender and otherwise, is more about power than any intrinsic fixed truth of who we really are. To me, modern life can feel like it's a cult of the individual. There is so much pressure on people to define who they are, as if it's every person's individual job and responsibility. I think this is a delusion.
This is not to say that any status quo is "right." Clearly social norms (big society, local community, chosen community, mixed community, family, etc.) can be oppressive and insensitive. Social norms can also be affirming, supportive and comfortable. But they are always there. Nobody establishes their own gender by themselves.
This is what is making this discussion so problematic.
First and foremost, you need to understand that gender is NOT a social construct. It is, at best, a social label. It IS performative in the sense that you need to be what you are, but what that is is determined by your body. By which I am not trying to say that whatever body you are born in is what you should see yourself as. Biology is not a perfect machine, and we humans have added all kinds of chemicals to the mix that have increased the failure rate of the already imperfect genetic mechanisms. My point is that you cannot really do anything about what your body, your brain chemistry, your hormones, tell you to be. This means that the question of subjective definition does not arise. You perform your "personal" gender, including, in the worst case, gender assignment surgery, if that is what is necessary for you to feel okay with yourself, then society looks at you and tells you what you are.
Where the whole gender discussion is going wrong imo is that these days every freak is eager to claim their own little label, when what they are is actually just a man or woman with a bit of a freak attitude. A bit of atypical behavior or preferences, a certain sexual kink, nothing really worth starting a discussion over. As a social being, the first question you should ask yourself is: am I really that special that the rest of the people should acknowledge that? Do I need to bother them with it, or do I already have enough freedom to live my life within the regular label that is being assigned to me?
@@Volkbrecht I think the point as to whether gender is a social construct or whether it is performative is up for debate. It's not a given.
@@Scarletpimpanel73 surely it is both?
any social construct is a consensus on [whatever] that becomes socially 'real' as a result through the performance by individuals... but the origin of that social construct in itself has to arise from somewhere, specifically in first one and then more and more people performing what initially is an innovation on an individual level. it is then always performative and, when it gains some sort of social 'critical mass' it takes the form of a nameable and recognisable social construct that encompasses minor individual variances, trends towards a normative form, and remains 'real' for as long as it serves a sufficient number of people within that society.
@@Volkbrecht Exactly! This motley crew of freaks, etc. give me a headache. What I've realised is how much they are affecting the mental health of society. Now I get truly anxious when I hear the word trans because I think what is the latest insanity I am going to hear.
The last I heard and saw was a man claiming to be a trans 'woman', at a rally, asking other men claiming to be trans 'women', to punch out biological women and being applauded for that. How???
These are clearly women hating men who have women envy/jealousy and want to claim woman and womanhood for themselves because as narcissistic men, they have deluded themselves they make better women than actual women. The whole thing is insane.
@@Scarletpimpanel73 A social construct by definition has to be performative in order to exist.
Remember David Reimer
And read his book.
butler does, and wrote about him the book undoing gender , very worth a read
Gender theory explained, managing never to define what gender is in the first place. That’s quite the feat.
she sounds like bill clinton when they asked him just about anything. ON one hand......
This video isn't going to provide you with a one sentence zinger. Much like race, gender requires cross disciplinary academic study. If you want to listen to what she's saying, she will provide you with an in-depth breakdown of gender and gender identity. This is an expert who has dedicated her life to academic research and sociological questioning. Assuming you know better just because you disagree is insanely arrogant.
@@wynburke It isn't a matter of disagreement. People just want to have it explained to them. Before getting into all the details, what does 'gender' actually mean?
Imagine coming into a video about a subject as vague and subjective from culture to culture as gender, thinking it's going to provide you with a rigid definition.
@@MindboxHost But are you able to offer at least a start? Give us a clue.
If gender is a social construct as Butler claims, why should we assume the individual has a right to determine their own gender for themselves? In other words, doesn’t the meaning of “social construct” include created by society? On the other hand, if it is the individual’s right and responsibility to determine their own gender, how and why is society as a whole obligated to respect the individual’s choice of said gender? Once what was a social construct becomes solely an individual construct, then all sorts of complications and outright absurdities arise.
A very good point, and an underrated comment.
Since people are social animals, maybe we unconsciously determine which social constructs are more appropriate to us (also with regards to one's sexual orientation). On the other hand, maybe it's all just a misconception in our minds that, under some social and phycological circumstances, compells us to choose a particular socially defined gender role, but in reality one's gender role is only an approximation of one's actual preferred behaviour and attitude in the society. This "actual preferred behaviour" probably is also socially influenced biological mechanism anyways though.
At the same time, if individuals make the society, doesn't the society and it's constructs rely on the individuals? It's like a two way street. Both can have positive and negative consequences.
@@akiadima3814 Yea, I guess it’s not an either/or but a both/and kind of thing. Still, the notion that a lone individual has sole responsibility over a social construct like pronouns while society is obligated to go along with it makes no sense to me.
Very good point. Assume gender is social construct, it should be a sum up of the whole society's perception. "If it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, then it must be a duck". Due to the significant biological differences, it is very natural result the gender became pretty much exchangeable conception of sex after human beings had society established. If everyone can determine their gender, that might also work, but I am afraid human beings would need get back to some sort primitive society which is constructed by isolated tribes.
"My whole life I've wanted to take a break from gender."
SAME. Hard same.
😂
I mean, that's pretty rich, considering she's spent literal decades doing NOTHING BUT obsess and browbeat others over gender.
It's interesting to note that she doesn't seem to acknowledge any potential drawbacks or obstacles that could arise from her theory
Enlighten us! Name the 1st 3 drawbacks that come to your mind!
@@ruzica1974 the enablement of those in power and control to exploit the desires of the masses to escape from solving their actual everyday issues and instead indulge in the pretense of joining a "noble cause" and thereby dividing society further to convenience their votemongering
@@ruzica1974 the increasing occurrences of trigger responses by those who see themselves as oppressed, the increasing ease at which they get triggered, the increasing lack of restraint when unleashing their emotions, etc.
there are right ways to do right things. there are also wrong ways to do right things.
just as plundering shops does not serve to push for racial equality, neither do these drawbacks serve gender equality or gender-whatever-you-want
Name few. Please. This can be valuable discussion. And I am not saying this in a sarcastic way. I do believe in having these discussions.
@@juzam6 'Seeing themselves as oppressed,' 'lack of restraint when unleashing their emotions.' Hmmm, are your rights under attack as trans peoples' are today? Are you told that you can't have sex without the potential life changing possibility that that one day could lead to a totally unplanned and unwanted future? Do you not see that your way is not the way for others? If you were facing your rights being removed, you would justifiably consider yourself oppressed. I wouldn't complain about you being down right pissed off about it either.
Here is what I do not understand. Why declare yourself the other gender just because of stereotypes? That's what this comes down to. Women are supposed to cook, clean, be mothers. Men are supposed to work, not cry, not cook, not wear pink, not have a purse, etc. Maybe instead of declaring ourselves the opposite gender, we should tell others that we are what we are and to deal with it.
There’s a big difference between stereotypes and the gender itself. That’s why there are tomboy trans girls and girly trans boys. People USE stereotypes to signal to others, but your gender is your gender.
That's precisely her point. Gender is treated as stereotype nowadays. If anything, Judith is trying to break free from it
I didn't transition because of stereotypes, I transitioned due to physical dysphoria. The fact that I act like a man is coincidental, or not, because it probably was also affected by my in utero development to a certain extent. I didn't get a penis because of stereotypes, I got one to have sex. You would have me live a miserable, loveless, sexless life where I felt disembodied and wrong 24/7, for what? To make you more comfortable? Your comfort with my life is your business, and you need to learn to keep it to yourself. You would have no idea I was trans if you saw me. I understand why they call us transgender, but I think most of us are better identified as transsexual frankly.
@@Matheus-ki9zoyeah but her theory makes no sense. She’s mixing being feminine and masculine with man and woman. Being a woman or man doesn’t involve anything to do with stereotypes or gender roles, it’s just your biology. A man is an adult human male and a woman is an adult human female. I’m not sure why there is confusion
I am concerced that this particular version of gender theory enables the perpetuation of gender-related stereotypes, in a way which suits the 21st century...
that's exactly what it does
its like a non ending cycle...
All versions of gender theory perpetuates nonsense and fictional ideas. It's good for freshmen level dorm room philosophical debates while stoned, but little else. The whole discipline should go the way of the dinosaurs already. There is no such thing as gender, period. There is only sex, and stuff we associate with it. There is nothing more and nothing less. If you want to call that stuff "gender" that's fine, but don't do that and then simultaneously say it should be deconstructed and use it to say apples are papers.
I think the professor is saying that people who don't conform to gender stereotypes should be respected for it. Why do you think it perpetuates them?
@@AmericoVespucioo because it creates a new group of people that define themselves by being different, which also enforce particular behavior
Butler keeps saying that sex is "assigned" at birth, BUT IT IS NOT.
Sex is RECOGNISED at birth. And that is the main difference.
Terminology, when not used properly, can sell any idea, agenda, philosophy or dogma, and people buy it.
People with AIS are assigned female at birth, despite having testes and XY chromosomes...
Expressions like those are describing objective reality. In objective reality there are no exceptions. If there are then you're not being objective.
You cannot say "all things are green, except when they're not" because you're not saying anything of any substance or worth hearing.
your preference for “recognize” changes nothing about butler’s argument or the gender discussion. the doctor recognizes sex characteristics and then assigns a sex category to the body usually based on genitalia. butler wouldn’t disagree with this
@@Graham-u2w it's not preference, but scientific research and methods. If you are not aware of the difference between "assigned" and "recognised" I recomend watching 5min speech of dr. Grossman. And then try to reply.
Medically she's correct, sex *is* assigned at birth, the doctor literally assigns you a sex based on a checklist of medical criteria.
This is a useful distinction to make because of intersex people, some intersex people are born with ambiguous genitalia, somewhere between male or female genitals, the doctors have to make a call as to how to assign that person's sex and sometimes they get it wrong.
@@treeaboo Nope... Sex is established at conception and is observed and documented at birth or before. No,
Gender (There are only 2 male/female... That's it) is established at conception and is observed at birth or before.
Way too many conflate gender/sex with personality traits and temperament (There are a ton, and none are gender exclusive-- hence effeminate males, butch females and tomboys), and gender roles (Which vary from culture to culture, society to society and country to country--BUT, they all refer to the roles of males and females in those various cultures, countries, and societies... Without exception), as though they're all synonymous and that's a massive error.
All women are born female, all men are born male and neither is a social construct, feeling, fetish nor a costume.
The main problem the trans activists have is that life is based in objective reality and the trans imagination just doesn't override the vast majority of people's capacity to discern the difference.
Your DNA literally organizes your physical body.
DNA dictates the production of objective biological differences between males and females. 100% of the population is either male or female, even intersex people. If they have a Y chromosome, they are heterogametic and male. If not, they are homogametic and female. But you knew that because you've actually educated yourself on these conditions, right?
Personality traits and temperament (Neither of which is gender exclusive -- hence effeminate males, butch females and tomboys), aren't synonymous with gender or gender roles.
There is no internal feeling that is exclusive to men or women (or boys/girls), what makes anyone a man or a woman is being either male or female and reaching adulthood. Their sex and stage of physical maturity makes them men or women, not some "feeling" they have.
Believing there is some "essence" specific to males or female as far as feelings go, that can manifest "in the wrong body", is akin to a religious belief, having faith in something that is impossible to prove or disprove. The thing is though, that no one on the "trans" side can actually even explain what this "essence" is, they can't even explain it to themselves yet have convinced themselves that the feeling they have means they "are in the wrong body" - without realizing that their discomfort simply stems from not realizing that they view conforming to sexist stereotypes as legitimate measures of manhood or womanhood. That is why every explanation given of WHY a male "can't be a man, but is instead woman" etc. relies upon listing stereotypical stuff, or, in some cases is completely abstract and refuses to actually provide any explanation of what they mean, simply stating they "know" that what they feel means what they say it does, even though they can't actually provide a definition of it. "It's hard to explain but I know I'm right" is an attitude one constantly comes up against - a religious faith in something they can't define.
This idea that the terms "man" and "woman" carry all this baggage, sexist stereotypes, that people need to live up to or feel comfortable with is a complete fabrication coming from the "trans" side. You lot want a term to reflect aspects of your personality as well, you want to create more boxes to put people in, as you won't accept simply just being a man or a woman based on being born male or female (and reaching adulthood, obviously people are boys and girls before becoming men or women), but believe you need this "freedom of expression" to broadcast what sexist stereotypes you feel more comfortable with - thinking the world needs to adopt the sexist view you lot have (you fail to see just how much you have in common with Conservatives).
Replacing objective definitions which are based in physical reality, with entirely subjective metaphysical claims, is not logical in any way, is not morally superior, and is demonstrably harmful, not least to female rights and protections, but also to practically anyone that buys into it as it warps people's perception of the underlying issues. It hinders people in their quest for individuation, creating this false narrative of them becoming more "authentic" when the total opposite is true, they believe they need validation from others in order to be happy etc. instead of being encouraged to find more inner strength and resilience with less reliance on how people see them. Demanding to be legally recognized as the opposite sex of what one is, is in no way shape or form more authentic than accepting the physical reality one is born into.
To believe we as individuals can have 100% control over our identity in society, what we are seen as by others, in interaction with, and in relation to, society/the world/physical existence is a fool's errand, it is a delusional understanding of reality and existence.
Honest questions (assuming that the definition of gender portrayed in the video is true): Why do transgender people want to change their sexual characteristics instead of just carrying themselves as men/women/whatever they feel like? Aren't people who identify as men/women purely based on the so called "social construct" just perpetuating the gender stereotypes? I ask myself this questions and I can't find a reasonable answer for them, so I don't find this definition of gender convincing. Please, I'd like to know your opinions in order to have a more nuanced view on this topic :)
Feeling women or men is a gender identity like other gender identity
i've been asking myself the same question in hopes of having a better understanding of the whole discourse, yet i haven't been able to find a convincing answer that isn't contradictory to some extent. if you feel like you're a man/woman opposing your biological sex then why change your body to fit a construct that was socially created and religiously supported to (stereotypically speaking) keep women in the kitchen and men in fights? or is it that that reasoning in itself is false and that men and women can be fluid and aren't defined by their gender roles, hence a man can be feminine, and a woman can be masculine. my problem with understanding that theory is that its sheer existence defies the sole purpose of transitioning in the first place, or does it not? what is masculine, and what is feminine then? and where do nonbinary people fit in this theory? how can they be so many theories that threaten and go against the other's principles? can multiple things be true at once, and if so, can it still be credible and of value?
This is why I support transmedicalism.
Being transgender concerns social identity and perception, while being trannsexual is more of a medical condition concerning physical sex.
@annrosentia oh you'd hate me. I'm changing my sex just because I want to.
You need to back away from this line of questioning entirely because you'll drive yourself into a tizzy trying to answer it.
Trans people, gender nonconforming people, etc, aren't a monolith. There's a lot of trans people who don't medically transition and don't change their outward characteristics, and there's many who do. Some are so bothered by their bodies that they seek medical interventions to change their sex entirely, and others arent and don't.
The point of this deconstruction of gender is to move away from these questions entirely. If a trans woman wants to have a hyper feminine appearance because it's validating then there's no need to analyze her behavior or wonder if she's perpetuating stereotypes. It's simply what she wants to do. Same thing if she wants to present as a very butch lesbian. It's what she wants. Same with trans men, nonbinary people, too.
Transmedicalism is nonsense, as is gender performativity theory. They have kernels of truth but neither is an adequate explanation and for me, as a trans woman who portrays a wide variety of gender presentations, I think trying to determine a grounded, solid theory on gender is a fools errand.
I think Abigail Thorne of Philosophy Tube put it best in her video on the NHS. It's right near the end.
To paraphrase: there are two things you need to know about gender, one, humans can indeed change sex, and two, do you want to?
It is manipulative language to say sex is assigned at birth. The sex of a child is observed by all who witness the birth and not assigned. There is a very small percentage of instances of intersex which requires further observation and weighing of factors.
sex is legally assigned at birth on a birth certificate
Bishop George Berkeley said that to be is to be perceived; in some sense the sex or gender of a child does not exist until it is observed by members of society, a society in which concepts of "male" and "female" exist. all that to say, you can apply whatever rigidity you want to sex and gender, but you have to acknowledge that that's not something inherent to nature or the universe.
also, don't even bother talking about God or the Bible. those are human societal constructions too.
Now , I understood the feeling of my students when they don't understand my explanation 😂😂😂
She didn't explain anything but her political position.
She defined gender and sex. If you disagree fundamentally with her definition, then you would not be open to understand the rest of the video.
@inaciocook You have to realize that one of the reasons we are all free to do as we like is because researchers like her were writing the books they wrote 20 years ago.
@inaciocook Yet, I contend that to state categorically - "I disagree" (which I too defend) while presenting no cogent explanation for your disagreement is a pity. I want to understand but (based on what you write) you are unwilling to engage with the ideas she presents or to offer your own in rebuttal.
@@free22 Researchers like her were mostly irrelevant, it's the STEM researchers that mattered. The very ones currently being prevented from being nurtured in universities because of the gender quota's in many universities that beliefs like those of her have created.
If gender isn't sex, why should people change their sex to fit their gender?
I feel like it would be pretty uncomfortable for someone's sex to not fit their gender, and maybe it's easier for them to change one or 2 parts of their body than their whole psyche.
To be honest I'm not sure, I'm a cis man - you'd have to ask someone who did that themselves
@stephenoxf If being a woman doesn't mean you have woman bits, why do you need to get woman bits to be a woman. It makes no sense.
@@JohnnyBelgium not all transpeople get gender affirming surgery
@Celestina0 That doesn't resolve the contradiction. If being a woman or man has nothing to do with your genitals, why are some people changing their genitals to be a man or a woman?
There is a fundamental logical flaw in gender ideology.
You can't change your sex. You can change your gender and someone who does that might express themselves in a way that makes them feel comfortable. This can be by changing your haircut or the clothes you wear or even with surgery. But this idea of changing the way you look and express yourselves isn't exlusive to trans people. Cis women might get lip filler or plastic surgery to feel more feminine and cis men might go to the gym to get more muscular. It's the same reason you don't often see men wearing a dress, because it's unmasculine and not the way they choose to express themselves. But it's important to keep in mind these gender roles aren't fixed across cultures and have changed across history.
Gender, personality, character, personal preferences, etc., all seem to be different words with meanings close to one another.
Great point! Maybe we should have used "personality" instead of gender. Before all this, when I was younger, doctor forms asked for "gender" meaning sex. It was interchangeable and meant the same thing. People gave the word "gender" a new definition, but I think much conflict would have been avoided if we just used a different word. "Hi I'm x and I have a female/ male/ non binary personality". Sounds much clearer and easy to understand.
That's what you get with decades of this psuedoacademic drivel
@@ladysensei1487 gender is just one aspect of personality, personality is much more than stuff that is related to sex, so a term like gender makes sense
If sex is assigned at birth, who put the genitalia there, the doctors?
@@deadeaded The term "assign" is essentially something given, transferred, appointed to someone. Sex can not be assigned, it is only verified by objective physical traits. To claim that it is assigned is to suggest that it has not objective verifiable traits by which it is identified, that's the beginning of the lie. The cultural and social significance of sex for babies when they are born is due to their parents' expectations and the obvious differential roles they occupy in the family and society. It does not happen like that with blood types. And nobody identifies as having a different blood type than what they have. So, the use of the word "assign" is to negate the objective reality of gender as being only male or female, which is nonsense because it cannot be assigned.
@@deadeaded you all have the same thinking problem of using words with meanings that they don't have, it's a dirty tactic. But I MUST stick to the strick meaning of the words in order to demand a sincere communication without tactics of manipulation. Sex can NOT be assigned in any way shape or form. Sex is a biological reality, not an emotional and illutional fluid idea to fit our personal desires. Sex is a the particular caracteristic of an organ, either the penis or the vagina with a spesific biological purpose. THAT, no human being can "assign" That is a product of biology, and exists outside of your emotions and mind. It's physical, not especulative.
You, either speak English or Chinese, but you can't mix both. In other words, you CANNOT use a word with a meaning that it does NOT have in order to make an illusory point. If you don't use the correct word for the idea you bring, it means dishonesty.
@@deadeaded I know words have different meanings in specific special fields. But that is not what you are doing in this case. The word "assign" is a verb, and no dictionary gives a meaning different than what it is in general. The genitalia is born with the baby, it is not "assigned" by anyone. The functional sexuality of the genitalia is a property of its own natural biology, nobody can distort it and make a penis get pregnant, or the vagina to beget. These things are biological, independent of the will or desires of anyone. So, sex is what it is. You cannot call a triangle a circle, or a square, a sphere. An identity disorder is what you identify with, but you cannot change your sex the same way that you can not change your chromosomes. If a surgery is done for that purpose, you may say that YOU are the one "assigning" a different form, but you are unable to change the constitutional reality of what is made by biology and is seen (Not "assigned") at birth.
@@deadeaded You need to understand that sex belongs to that "raw biological reality" and so, it is impossible to be assigned. "Identity" is what in your case, you chose or feel later in life when you are more conscious of the social environment. So, you may identify as having a sex witch you do not have in your "raw biological reality" because it is in your subjective reality, which is your mind, not your body. In that case, again, YOU are the one "assigning" an imaginary sex to yourself which does not match objective reality.
For that reason you cannot say that sex is "assigned at birth" Because that would be to claim that your subjective identity can override "raw biological reality" which is factually IMPOSSIBLE. We don't "categorize" people's minds or "sexual identity" when they are born, we simply recognize their physical, and so, physiological sexual trait.
Of course, blood types do not have the social significance that sex has. The significance of blood types is rather physiological, less visible, and do not create a difference between the prominent social traits of the sexes. When we say "it's a boy", or "It's a girl" we know there will be fundamental biological, social and psychological differences that we cannot change. For example, only the girl will be able to get pregnant and breast feed a new child despite her blood type. And so the boy only is able to beget despite his blood type. That is UNCHANGEABLE despite the "identity" that is chosen. Together with that, nature has also bestowed the sexes with other social and psychological caracteristics that are prominent and fundamentally important for the family and society independently of their blood type.
If a woman claims to be a man, and so her sex is "masculine", she is subconsciously attesting that she has the physical traits (raw biological reality) of a man. And vice-versa. Even thogh she can only get pregnant and not able to get another woman pregnant. But you give this assumption more importance than the facts. We, to the contrary, recognize the facts, we do not "assign" them based on feelings. If the original meaning of sex is the "raw biological reality" it is never assigned. We cannot assign an assumed sexuality based on personal feelings to the objective facts of genitalia and their function.
@@deadeaded I believe you are the one confused here. You are both confused about what you believe, confused about what I say, and confused at the time of wording yourself. This has been simple and easy to understan for millenia, just until a group of you decided to change reality and the minds of others. Anyone else could have clearly understood me.
According to the Webster Dictionary,
Sex:
Either of the two major forms of individuals that occur in many species and that are distinguished respectively as female or male especially on the basis of their reproductive organs and structures.
Gender:
The behavioral, cultural, or psychological traits typically associated with one sex.
Yes, everybody knows a man has a penis and a woman a vagina. When a man says he is a woman, he is not only "identifying" with the woman's gender, but with their sexual organs too, reason why many of them even have surgery to remove their penis and fabricate a vagina on them, reason why sportsmen, after they become "transwoman" they ignore all the other physical masculine traits that give them an unfair advantage against women in sports and compete against them robbing them from their achievements and medals. Reasons why they are demanding to abolish the words man and woman, father and mother, and to abolish father and mother's day. Reasons why some of them believe they can get pregnant and have had abortion clinics to simulate an abortion, one even had a doctor insert a fetus into his womb to give birth. Reasons why some have demanded to destroy the male public urinals to have all other men sit on toilets to urinate like women. And similar things from women. Ironically, I don't yet know of any "transmen" who have dared to compete agaist men in sports, the hypocrisy is obvious.
(Continue...)
Women are adult human females.
yeah...?
Do you have any original thoughts, or are you just parroting Matt Walsh?
"Woman: an adult who lives and identifies as female" - So it takes two factors to be a woman, identification and lifestyle. So in that definition it is not being but doing that makes a person a woman. What does it mean that someone lives as a female?
she is making statements without explaning why what she is talking about is true
is this scientology?
@@mikesrandomvideospretty much
@LaughingStock55 Your DNA literally organizes your physical body.
DNA dictates the production of objective biological differences between males and females. 100% of the population is either male or female, even intersex people. If they have a Y chromosome, they are heterogametic and male. If not, they are homogametic and female. But you knew that because you've actually educated yourself on these conditions, right?
Personality traits and temperament (Neither of which is gender exclusive -- hence effeminate males, butch females and tomboys), aren't synonymous with gender or gender roles.
There is no internal feeling that is exclusive to men or women (or boys/girls), what makes anyone a man or a woman is being either male or female and reaching adulthood. Their sex and stage of physical maturity makes them men or women, not some "feeling" they have.
Believing there is some "essence" specific to males or female as far as feelings go, that can manifest "in the wrong body", is akin to a religious belief, having faith in something that is impossible to prove or disprove. The thing is though, that no one on the "trans" side can actually even explain what this "essence" is, they can't even explain it to themselves yet have convinced themselves that the feeling they have means they "are in the wrong body" - without realizing that their discomfort simply stems from not realizing that they view conforming to sexist stereotypes as legitimate measures of manhood or womanhood. That is why every explanation given of WHY a male "can't be a man, but is instead woman" etc. relies upon listing stereotypical stuff, or, in some cases is completely abstract and refuses to actually provide any explanation of what they mean, simply stating they "know" that what they feel means what they say it does, even though they can't actually provide a definition of it. "It's hard to explain but I know I'm right" is an attitude one constantly comes up against - a religious faith in something they can't define.
This idea that the terms "man" and "woman" carry all this baggage, sexist stereotypes, that people need to live up to or feel comfortable with is a complete fabrication coming from the "trans" side. You lot want a term to reflect aspects of your personality as well, you want to create more boxes to put people in, as you won't accept simply just being a man or a woman based on being born male or female (and reaching adulthood, obviously people are boys and girls before becoming men or women), but believe you need this "freedom of expression" to broadcast what sexist stereotypes you feel more comfortable with - thinking the world needs to adopt the sexist view you lot have (you fail to see just how much you have in common with Conservatives).
Replacing objective definitions which are based in physical reality, with entirely subjective metaphysical claims, is not logical in any way, is not morally superior, and is demonstrably harmful, not least to female rights and protections, but also to practically anyone that buys into it as it warps people's perception of the underlying issues. It hinders people in their quest for individuation, creating this false narrative of them becoming more "authentic" when the total opposite is true, they believe they need validation from others in order to be happy etc. instead of being encouraged to find more inner strength and resilience with less reliance on how people see them. Demanding to be legally recognized as the opposite sex of what one is, is in no way shape or form more authentic than accepting the physical reality one is born into.
To believe we as individuals can have 100% control over our identity in society, what we are seen as by others, in interaction with, and in relation to, society/the world/physical existence is a fool's errand, it is a delusional understanding of reality and existence.
Just because I would not like this idea to be lost, I think that beyond sex and gender, the underlying discussion is what we understand by democracy and how we are going to generate ways to ensure freedom to live for all bodies. I love that development that Butler does ❤.
She doesn't know anything about democracy. She's not a social science academic.
Referring to people as "bodies" is going the opposite direction from things like freedom and democracy..
@@SineEyed But even as bodies they are not free to live, they need to be mutilated, several times, and follow medical care all their body life. Concerning democracy, is it democracy when women cannot practise their sports between themselves and when they must accept people with a penis in their bathroom?
8:45 Quoting a change in the Cambridge dictionary from 2022 is not proof - it could be argued that the editors don’t want to be seen as transphobic just as easily as it can be argued that the meaning of the word ‘woman’ has meaningfully changed in society.
Isn't the mere fact they don't want to be seen as transphobic sufficient in indicating a change in a general societal attitude toward transphobia, therefore toward gender, therefore toward the binary categorization of man and woman?
Dictionaries don't dictate the definition and use of words, they reflect and catalogue the use of words in society. Language is a living thing that changes over time. Some words have completely changed their meanings over the years.
You cannot separate sex and gender. They are one and the same.
Why not? You can & you should as it leads to better understanding of the world
Quote:- "Sex is assigned to infants that has importance within medical and legal worlds" - Crumbs, that's a very strange definition.
Firstly - why do we now say that sex is *assigned* at birth? That implies it is someone's opinion, they could have gone either way in their decision. Sex is not assigned, it is *observed* . There is no opinion involved, the decision could not go one way or the other, it is either one or the other, it is *observed* at birth.
Secondly - sex is "either of the two main categories (male and female) into which humans and most other living things are divided on the basis of their reproductive functions".
sex is not observed at birth. they don’t test your chromosomes or your gonads or know for certain which secondary sex characteristics you’ll have.
and sex is a spectrum, not a binary. if it were a binary, intersex and transexual people wouldn’t exist
I don't think this is entirely accurate as labelling an individual with sex involves an opinion on the observations.
For a start, how do you assign sex to a person who has an ambiguous reproductive function (infertility, androgen insensitivity, possession of both ovaries and testes)? One might look at secondary sexual characteristics like breast development and facial hair. However, even within these areas, the ambiguity cannot be ignored. To resolve these ambiguities, an opinion is necessary.
I see that the line between male and female can be very blurry. In this case, it points to the conclusion that sex is not a complete model of human biology and that there might exist a better conception or theory of sex such as a spectrum, more categories, or simply abolishing sex as a system and instead focusing on more measurable properties. Post-modernists may think any measurement you make is a social construction but it is better at least.
P. S. The point is not really whether sex is assigned or observed, but that it means nothing in the context of what you are and what you can potentially be. In my understanding, the notion of assignment, as opposed to observation, serves to deconstruct biological sex in hopes of allowing people more freedom in their self-definition.
@@ChanMC153 I grant you there may be exceptions were hidden factors could change things, don't think infertility is one of them though. That's just something not working. You don't become an inbetween sex if your ovaries don't produce eggs, or your sperm don't work. Possessing both ovaries and testes, now that could make you non binary. I think the rest of what you are referring to is gender. I used to think gender and sex were the same thing, but I think gender is more about what you feel as opposed to what you are. I don't think gender can be observed or assigned at birth.
@@richardarcher3435 Saying one does not become an in between sex when one’s reproductive organs don’t work is fine. However, this raises the question of what sex actually is if it is not the production of gametes.
You might say it’s the predicted reproductive function of the body, but then how exactly does that prediction work? To what extent do your ovaries have to resemble ovaries? What is the ideal set of ovaries by which you are measuring the difference? In some cultures, post menopausal women have been perceived as a separate sex entirely. Of course, they have not recognised the difference between sex and gender, the “immanent” and the “performative”. However, naturalisation of performance is observed all the time, who’s to say our perception of sex as unchangeable “natural” categories is truly natural? Gender is part of the language by which we understand the world. Just like actual languages, we cannot simply choose not to use a language if it is the only one we know. The extent to which the categories of sex is a consequence of gender is unclear to me.
Sex is NOT assigned ever. Sex is our gender, either male OR female. How is it assigned? Does the babe come out like barbie or ken, then a penis or vagina is made after the doctor makes the decision? Open the drawer marked 'Penis' and slap it on. the world has gone completely friggin nuts. Therapy for all the confused pieces of sexless meat roaming the good ole' messed up usa. goodbye, hope you guys decide what you feel like being this week. ffs
Didn't watch the whole thing but my understanding has been that sex is a physical objective reality of birth, gender is a psychological and spiritual self identity. Gender roles are arbitrary social constructs that vary between cultures and periods.
Sexes are male and female, with intersex people being both. Gender is male and female with some being both. There are not 90+ genders. Sexual preferences are being erroneously labeled as genders.
Well stated. It's important to note that some psychological traits can be significantly more difficult to change than biology.
Gender is a word WASPS/doctors in the 50's invented to be more polite when asking whether someone had a dongle or a port on their paperwork.
Mrs. Judith Butler is a social construct
I mean you're technically correct, so are you. Titles like 'Mrs.' and names are entirely social constructions, useful ones, but social constructions nonetheless.
@@treeaboo All men are born male, all women are born female and neither are social constructs, feelings, fetishes or costumes. The science shows the natural s3xu@l dichotomy of all mammals as being male/female. Humans are mammals, and they are male or female, respectively. That state is fixed and permanent. If you change the name of an apple to an orange, it doesn't alter the nature of an apple or an orange in any way, and the same is true when renaming a man something else-- like trans. It doesn't change the nature of the man.
Women are all born female, and men are all born male, which makes the use of cis/trans intellectually hollow and useless
Like driving within a speed limit.@@treeaboo
a social nutcase
@@treeaboo The information of a personality is encoded in the brain, there is a material, objective reality from which arises the subjective phenomena of social behaviour and experience. Nothing, and I mean, litterally nothing about a human personality is "entirely social constructions." This social construct "theory" is only so widely believed because you can learn all there is to know about it in an afternoon and it easily conforms to political ideology, personal preference and self validation because there's basically no facts, it's not a scientific theory of human behaviour, it's just a bunch of guess work dressed up by careerist essay writers to sound like a real theory to scientifically uneducated people who're already inclined to believe it for personal or political reasons.
I was labeled in 1975 at 5yrs old as having "chronic sexual identity crisis". By 1983 I was socially transitioning at school and with friends behind my parents backs. By 14 in 1984 I left home and found my way to the LGBTQ part of town. I met an older Mexican trans woman named Chinga who sold me hormones she smuggled in from Mexico. So 40yrs ago I medically transitioned as a child on my own terms regardless of what others tried to tell me. I've never had one single regret about owning my womanhood in life. This is who I've always been. Now I'm a happy 54yr old post op woman living happily in California.
Whatever you are, you are not a woman.
It seems to me that the only that has gone 'fluid' is the meaning of the word gender itself.
So if gender means that little and people can do whatever they want with it until the point where it stops meaning anything, how is it still a distinction of any relevance, to which some people still want to identify as.
I ID as a dog on Thursdays and a woman of colour and lezbyan on the weekends; Mondays I play the white man with a gun telling black folks to .... well Narc. Chaos = where next ?
It is likely that, if we're able to reach a point in which we're free to gender ourselves as we please, gender will become a useless concept, yes, but we're not at that point yet.
Who says it means "that little"though? Fluidity doesn't equal lack of meaning. If I change professions from carpenter to systems engineer it means my profession has been fluid, but it doesn't take away the meaning of either of those professions, the same goes for gender. It's a role we play in society, that role can change, but at any point it has a current state and that state is absolutely 100% meaningful.
@@empireoflightz the actual difference between changing genders and changing professions is that there is something physically tangible in the essence of switching professions. You can not be a carpenter without in some way working with your hands, use a hammer, carry dry-wall, raising houses. Switching proffesions is not something you can do on a whim, it must meet certain criteria.
Whatever those critera might be, these criteria are something which are verifiable by others. The problem I see with gender is that the concepts revises itself when it gets criticized, and now the term is so ubituqous that gender can essentially be anything, all the time. I could, for all you know, have changed my gender 10 times writing this comment, but I couldnt have changed my profession 10 times. The problem as to why this concept of gender isn't useful is because there is no way for you to verify whether or not i changed my gender. What we have created is an un-verifiable part of my identity which is totally free from physical and biological reality. To me that sounds alot like a spiritual soul. If concept comes to mean anything and everything, ultimately that term comes to mean nothing.
@Freddielovefootball this is typical paranoia when things change in society, as they inevitably always do, people start imagining extreme scenarios as if they're the natural continuation of the change that is happening, when they're really not. "I could've changed my gender 8 times while writing this" well the only way that could happen is if you're extremely gender fluid, and those are extreme rare cases. The vast majority of people have one gender which reflects how they actually feel inside, what role they feel they can most authentically play in society and so on, and this gender doesn't change throughout their live. What does change for a small minority of people (trans people) is that they realise that gender isn't the one they were assigned at birth and have most of the physical/biological characteristics of, and so a transition needs to happen for them to live their healthiest and happiest lives. Only a very small minority out of this small minority might be "gender fluid" in the sense that they might then at some point see it necessary to transition again, or indeed could do so 8 times a day. I say this as a NB person who knows a lot of NB and trans people, I don't know anyone like that so I can't tell you much about them. But to then say gender doesn't mean anything anymore just because it's more abstract for this tiny tiny group of people, is an extremely exaggerated extrapolation of a particular scenario.
The vast majority of trans people want their body and tangible gender manifestation to be a very particular way that reflects their gender identity, and they generally want to stay that way, to the extent that current medicine allows us to. For most of us there's a clear role too that we play in society according to our gender and our physical changes are made in order to comply better with what society expects from and how it reacts to certain genders. In the case of non binary people that isn't then mostly just a made up abstract thing but a case of not being able to fit into traditional binary gender roles in very specific ways, and so we try to ask for more flexibility from society as far as those roles and expectations by expressing ourselves as neither man nor woman, and while each of us might have a unique mix of characteristics from either of those genders, that mix isn't generally subject to changing any more than a cis person might become slightly more feminine or masculine during the course of their lives.
I don't think this video even begins to approach answering the question posed in the title. At least beyond stating the question.
I'm more confused than when I started.
It was.
@@mostazezo it was what?
Because she’s full of BS and loves to hear herself speak! The made up concept that she sucked out of her thumb of gender, is really just synonymous with self expression and personality! So can we get on with everything?
At least Judith isn't using technical language here. If you try reading their books it's very difficult to understand much of what they write.
I think gender are the societal norms and standards created around sex, and ones perception of em.
First I want to say I'm very sorry if my words hurt any sensibility. Here is my point , I don't understand why the debate is so strong on this particular topic. It isn't more significant than any other type of discrimination . What I mean is I see it upside-down : it seems to me that every single person is very unique and try to find in others some similarities to feel understood , just to share the very feelings of existence and luckily put words on it in order to grow one's inner peace and comprehension. I think the real problem is we (humans in society) hide behind those similarities making them strong representative statements (gender or whatever else we use to define our identity). It looks like we stay in those illusions to forget that our unique point of view crossing existence can make us feel very lonely and therefore afraid. To me , normality and stereotypes are just fake and useless shelters against this particular fear. I'd say we should try to reach ease with this idea as we are bound to each other by it. And then hopefully we'd feel grateful to have the chance to interact . I don't think we need more revendicative battling , as it feels to me that division and violence are fed by it those days. Violence is exactly what we don't want towards the other who will unavoidably always be different. Maybe we should actually learn how to "take a break from gender".
2:02 "Sex is generally a category that is assigned to infants".
I hear this 'very' misleading terminology only from people pushing gender. Sex isn't "assigned", it's recognised. It exists regardless of the physician. If the baby were delivered by the mother in the middle of a forest with nobody around, the child would still be the same sex. Nobody assigns it.
"Assigned" implies that it is something given. It is not. It is something innate which naturally develops during gestation.
Whenever people need to use deceptive language to push their ideology, they're not pushing a gender as much as they are an agenda.
Sex is way more complicated than we generally think, so the one just looking at a baby might be wrong or only have a limited amount of data, or is looking at a baby with genitals that are not that easy to pinpoint... So yes, it's assigned. And what sex they said you were at birth might not be correct, or that easy to decide on, when you look at all the factors that makes up biological sex.
@@AlecS-p4b If you're male and a physician says you're female, then the physician is incorrect. Your sex is what it is. That's not assigning. That's a person making a mistake in 'recognising'.
There are a tiny minority of cases where sex isn't readily discernible. We're talking approximately 0.018% of the population. There is a greater percentage of people born with six toes on each foot. Is number of toes assigned at birth too, or are they just 'there'?
If you can easily determine sex at a glance for 99.982% of the population, which you can, I don't think we can say with any confidence or credence that sex is more complicated than we think.
I usually don’t comment but this time I wanted to have a good discussion about This topic so I believe that the reason behind A woman wants to be called a man or the opposite is because the society gives a stereotype about how a woman should look like or how a man should look like which Leads to if a woman wants to dress up like a “man” she will feel like she should be called a man , I feel like we shouldn’t change the gender we should change the stereotype + I don’t think there is something going to makes you a woman or a man other than your body because i personally Believe that not all woman acts , feels or desire the same things neither are man , what do you think? and if you think i messed a point please comment I want to hear your opinions but please be respectful ❤
the point is that the concept of man and of woman aren't fixed nor defined by society, as much as some people want it to be. I cannot agree with your statement because you part of the assumption that "a woman who wants to be called a man" isn't a man even when they say, and performe, that they are. Furthermore, the way a body is also doesn't encapsulate all of the ideia of gender, as biology doesn't always go hand in hand with the way a person may express their gender - like intersex people or trans people.
Gender and stereotype aren't the same thing because the former encompasses a lot of ways one can assert their own identity beyond what masculinity or femininity is suposed to be. Physical attributes sure ain't it.
@@pedroh.pereira8292 99.9% of the time, a child's physical sex characteristics observed & recorded in the delivery room will predict his or her physical sex characteristics as an adult with astonishing accuracy. the intersex exceptions do not change the rule.
I think you are correct. What Butler pretentiously calls "gender identity" I would just call personality. Every man and woman could have their own unique personality, and still 99.9% of us can be clearly seen to belong to one of two sexes. All the confusion arises due to social pressures, stereotypes, etc.
@@ClintLock1 but gender is not encapsulated by sex characteristics, as the ideias of man and woman live outside those parameters. One can designate a gender to dolls, clothes and even elements of nature (latin languages often call the moon or the sea female and the sun male). Another point is that is impossible to essencialize sex characteristics that designate gender: the man must always have a beard? Is gender always associated with the capacity of having children? Even hormones aren't a safe way to determine a person's gender (just research the case of the woman two time Olympic champion that wasn't allowed to compete because of her naturally "high" testosterone levels - an decision made by an arbitrary marker that was later changed by the Olympic Committe)
That said, even if the exception of the rule is .1%, in a global scale that sums about 70 million people that are misgendered by a reductionist way of recognizing people.
@@pedroh.pereira8292 I only meant to address your intersex point. As you summarize, yes indeed social roles, rules, and culture are very complicated, and vary widely by time and place.
But the issue of "gender" ought to be demystified: it really comes down to social expectations imposed on individuals based on their sex. For instance, only women can give birth (call them "assigned female at birth" if you want... it's the same thing... and yes, some women are infertile... all this can be true). So, society expects women to give birth, so the human species will continue. A certain majority of women must take up this responsibility, or we go extinct. Obviously some women will not want this responsibility, for whatever reason. But is this some magical essence they possess, called "gender" ? Or is it simply the age-old conflict between social roles and people's inner desires?
In any case the "brain in the wrong body" medical quackery brings nothing but confusion and suffering, and should be put to rest...
Sex is not 'assigned'
It's very hard to listen to Butler speak. It's as if she is intentionally using complex language to obscure the implication of what she's saying..
To my mind, the truth can always be stated in a simple and clear way.
or maybe you just dont understand... nothing wrong with that.
Maybe you need to exercise your mind
The more I understand about gender, the more I realise there are only two...
two sexes yes, there is no steady/set script that every body (gender) "type" must or does follow - how we perform our day
Gen/sec are the same thing. Social behaviour is another thing.
@@thechoosentwice1312 they r not intersex ppl r proof of that
@@saikohart3058Okay, what is ''intersec'' people?
@@thechoosentwice1312 ppl who r born w what is a perceived as male or female sex characteristics
0:33 - "At some point in life we ask ourselves, where did that assumption come from?"
No, we don't. At least not the vast majority of us. I do appreciate the optimism, though.
Can you see ur privilege
@@BoopaDiBeppo I have no idea what you mean. Glad you saved the y and the o.
😂😂😂😂right! Literally no one asks themselves that unless it is pushed against them
you never question norms and just blindly follow them with not a single conscious thought?
@@v1ped Stop being a reactionary idiot for just a moment and see my comment for what it was.
What's her opinion on John Money and his experiment on David Reimer?
Its always interesting to me that John Money is used to attack transpeople, when the lesson that should be taken from the John Money situation is the opposite - you cannot impose a gender on someone and insist they follow it based solely on their biological characteristics. The consequences can be severe mental trauma. This is exaclty what trans people have been arguing for decades!
@@Celestina0So you shouldn't push your gender ideology on children?
@@whateverwhatever4026you shouldn’t pick your kids gender for them. what transphobes want to do to trans kids isn’t much better than what john money did to the poor kid.
@@Celestina0 That's called confirmation bias. The only reason that Rimer had an issue with his gender was that it was objectively incongruent with his biology. Gender dysphoria is when you "feel" as though there is an incongruency between your sex and gender - but gender dysphoria is a mental disorder while Rimer was simply lied to.
@@whateverwhatever4026the only one forcing children to be who they are not is you tbh
Complete nonsense.
What insightful humane compassionate understanding ! Wow !
I was reading a children's book recently which is designed to 'educate' children on this topic. The very first page was an exercise in mental gymnastics and utter stupidity. The answer to "what is gender"? conflated sex with 'gender'. On the very next page we get the actual definition of 'gender', ie. that it's an oppressive, sexist social construct, but whoever wrote this mumbo jumbo obviously can't string two thoughts together and missed their ligtbulb moment. The book should be in the fiction shelves of the bookstore under 'comedy', not presented as fact to developing minds. Our kids have a right to a quality, factual education, not indoctrination into ideological dogma that not even the ideologues themselves understand.
Ok Karen, why don't you go take your meds
"We live in a Democracy" LOL
Why are we confusing kids with all this gender stuff. We should tell kids You are born male or female. After that you are free to be and do whatever the hell you want. But the facts are facts like if at birth you're able to give birth then your a woman.
True. Kids need to remain as boys and girls, play dolls or cars and later become independent humans.
10 minutes in and now refuse to vote for student loan forgiveness. Berkeley teaches this? How sad.
at the heart of these controversies is fascism and stupidity of some ... the notion that one can impose his reality on everyone else by fiat ..
I would pay big bucks to see a debate between her and Jordan Peterson.
What would be the point? They both have their material out there to consume and digest. Also, for a deeper dive into the philosophy of the whole thing, maybe you want to look more into James Lindsay, unless you already have. Peterson has his thoughts about cultural Marxism, but ultimately his take on philosophy is more centered around the truth in religion and how to use that for self-betterment. Lindsay is much more into the philosophy and history of critical theory.
Why? She is dishonest intelectually. She does not have internal structure to say anything of importance. Just a word salad.
Gender = personality
you can be born with broken software
you can live with it
but it's not as nature design things to be
it's how people do up things escaping from own natural environment breaking own natural software making billions miserable
And this is why people find this whole thing ridiculous. They say that its essentially a mix of culture and all but theirs absolutely no grounding for what it is. I can identify as a woman and someone who is the complete opposite of me can also identify as a woman. It s not about freedom of expression, its about feeding into delusion
Indeed
The point is you can feel whatever you want, thats the goal, but the society, culture and environment you live in, is influencing you on how a girl or boy has to dress, act and feel at a very young age. Girls need to take care of their families and boys aren't allowed to cry, "boys dont cry". all these little factors shape of what we think of how gender identity functions in society and how we HAVE TO act instead of how we want to.
@@user-qq6qb6kr3f gender norms are norms, not requirements
@@johnsmith7140 try explaining that the society we live in
@user-qq6qb6kr3f plenty of masculine females and effeminate males in our society- always have been
"we no longer speak about family, woman, man, desire, sex in the same way". Perhaps for Judith, but in the majority of social groups geared towards bringing children into the world via healthy sexual reproduction, this hasn't changed.
she's talking about society.
oh well then we should ignore the change from traditional no sex till marriages to the now "norm" of sex being way more open. or hey how about mothers are a lot of the time not house wife's any more that she is a family change
Every single couple having children go through intense renegotiation of their relationship and the work/power/nurturing balance within it when babies arrive and to suggest that is not happening is absolutely oblivious. Perhaps you have not had children yet or have not spoken to parents of young children. Ask a woman how things change when babies arrive and you may find out alot about gender norms that are not working for either parent. Far less for the woman. Go ahead and ask.
@@marshhen i did not deny that when a family want a kid they will talk it out and how to organize their work life kid balance its a lot of planning of and to each couple their own ways of balancing it . i was more trying to show how few decades (a century maybe?) women were expected to be house wifes a lot of the time and have most of the work that goes on taking care of a house and kids while in modern days that became a lot more open or at least the numbers changed.