Q4BP: How do view biological sex/gender/masculinity/femininity/etc.?

CursedLemon · 2016-06-11T23:24:06+00:00

Phenotype is innate. Hormones are innate. Sexual desire is innate.

Overall personality, courting rituals, and generally how you treat people is not innate.

[deleted] · 2016-06-11T15:14:16+00:00

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5th_Law_of_Robotics · 2016-06-11T14:25:59+00:00

There are definitely cultural aspects that have nothing to do with biology (boys like blue and girls like pink).

And there are definitely people who don't fit or who overlap.

But a lot of it is due to inherent biological differences in brain wiring and hormones which applies more often than it doesn't.

And there's nothing wrong with that. It's ok that woman on average are more interested in being around kids and men on average are more interested in competition and risk taking.

As long as it isn't rigidly enforced we should be ok with men and women on net gravitating to different spheres.

[deleted] · 2016-06-12T00:36:32+00:00

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hakosua · 2016-06-11T07:11:29+00:00

What do you see as innate and what are social constructs and/or mentalities?

My recollection from undergrad is that, by definition, sex is innate whereas gender refers to the socially constructed roles and identities which are related but not strictly tied to sex. (See? Liberal arts degrees aren't pointless.)

Can men be women or women be men?

You can be whatever you put your mind to, sweetie. Your mom and I will support you 100%.

Are there similarities?

Yes.

Is everyone individually different?

Yes.

What do you believe about sex and gender?

As tempted as I am to bullshit my way through this one, I'm going to try to answer seriously.

Sex is not as clear cut as we like to think it is; it's complicated by a number of rare intersex conditions, as well as by hormonal variations. I don't think gender can be entirely disentangled from sex, and I do believe in innate sexual differences. But I also believe there's tremendous within-group variability. Furthermore, it's very hard to distinguish between innate and environmentally-determined differences, especially when discussing aptitudes, preferences, and personality traits.

The evolutionary arguments posed by people who view gender roles as entirely or almost entirely biologically predetermined have always struck me as a little too convenient; they'll always sound plausible and scientific because they're always being made to confirm pre-existing data. Then again, this is also true of arguments for cultural determination. Personally, I'm more interested in the implications of gender roles than I am in their etiology. Why get stuck worrying about how we came to be when we need really to be deciding how best to move forward?

yo_radical_one · 2016-06-11T13:12:26+00:00

Gender is biologically defined and modern society pushes against our innate instincts because of false pseudo-religious notions of equality of outcome.

RareBlur · 2016-06-11T06:35:56+00:00

Are we talking about transgender?

I view that as none of my business.

Princeso_Bubblegum · 2016-06-11T06:35:41+00:00

In general, I think men and women are different, and that isn't something society has constructed. However, I kind of view it as something that exists more in a statistical fashion, than an absolute or something you use to judge someone from the onset. I often compare it to extroversion vs introversion. Extroverts and introverts are different, but like, extroverts can still be quite and read and introverts can be conversational, and you can find people out there who aren't quite either, its kind of a spectrum going on, I see gender the same way.

Very few things with gender are absolutes, like, I think one of the very few things I recall from my antropology class that women do in all primitive societies is collect the firewood... which has absolutely no serious connection to the modern world (although I guess its useful when camping lol).

This SMBC comic sums up my view.

Also, as a transgender person, I am pretty sure that I exist.

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SkinnySweaty · 2016-06-12T08:52:48+00:00

What do you see as innate and what are social constructs and/or mentalities?

Social constructs are the pressures that society exerts upon us our entire lives to conform to the norm. Girls act like this and boys act like this. We get that from our parents, our relatives, our teachers, our peers, our media... literally everything around us. It is a gigantic shaping force in everyone's life. JOIN THE HERD.

Now for people who naturally feel like a male or those who feel like a female and they are in those respective body, assimilation is easy. But there are obviously those who feel like their gender does not fit. That is where our innate selves come in to play.

It's both at the same time, two very powerful forces.

yusrasyedahmed · 2016-07-24T13:31:08+00:00

I believe that humans , both make and female, are generally meant to be androgynous. The media influence on what men are supposed to be and what women are supposed to be just fucks with us

Title	Q4BP: How do view biological sex/gender/masculinity/femininity/etc.?
Author	CovenantoftheSun
Upvotes	7
Comments	52
Date	June 11, 2016 5:15 AM UTC (10 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/PurplePillDebate
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/PurplePillDebate/comments/4nk7s5/q4bp_how_do_view_biological/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/PurplePillDebate/q4bp-how-do-view-biological.274361 https://theredarchive.com/post/274361

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