Forums > Social Chat > Gender poll

Posted: 14th Mar 2003
i agree

in the online community it doesn't matter either what gender you are born with or what you 'in real life' identify with. The great thing about online is that you can just be yourself and people will just accept you for whom you are, irrelevent of trivial things such are gender, race, age etc. All that matters, to me at least, is whether you a nice, considerate, trustworthy person.

flid

Posted: 14th Mar 2003
Good point. I had two transsexual professors in college.

-Mike

Certified Mad Doctor and HoP High Priest of Nutella



A buckuht n a hooze! -Valura

Posted: 14th Mar 2003
Hermaphrodites also could have cause for complaint. Perhaps neither, other or both?

Posted: 14th Mar 2003
What about a cuttlefish masqerading as a staffer...?

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Posted: 14th Mar 2003
Say Wha---?
*shrugz*
i guess you could put that, but i have never met a hermaphrodite.....
mabey they are nice, mabey they aren't it's okay with me as long as the have fresh tea...

-LuNcHbOx, Aka. Nathan...Give a man to fish, and that man knows where to come for more fish...Teach a man to fish and you have just destroyed your market base...

Posted: 15th Mar 2003
that's all very well flid, but it's nice to know. The number of balding 40 year old men I meet who've pretended, online, to be 18 year old, bare footed hippy goddesses is astounding!

Anyway, see that big thing on the horizon. Big, rocky and points upwards. That is what is technically refered to as a mountain. This here, this is a mole hill.

[ 15. March 2003, 22:55: Message edited by: Dom ]

AnonymousPLATINUM Member

Posted: 15th Mar 2003
LOLs at Dom

err guys? reality check!

The question wasnt about biological sex, it was about gender. Check your definitions. Transexualism and hermaphroditism are technically sex related, not gender related.

Aside from that, what do you think would happen if you put 'other' as a choice on there? Do you think it would make the results of the survey more or less accurate?

Josh

Posted: 15th Mar 2003
Well, lookey lookey! We've got an interesting debate on our hands. On HOP no less. Who knew?

And that's just what this is: a debate. Some people have declared that there are really only two sexes (male and female), but many genders. True hermaphroditism is very rare (there probably isn't even be a true hermaphrodite alive today), although some interesting biological quirks happen. For example, testicular feminization syndrome is a condition in which a genetically male individual (XY chromosomes) has a defective testosterone receptor. The result is a person who looks like a woman (with the exception of the fact that there is no hair on the body anywhere below the neck) but has no female reproductive organs. But these departures from the strict male/female biological classifications are viewed as "defects" and not as true "sexes." I can see the logic in this view, actually, although I am not so sure that I agree with it. In fact, I doubt I'll ever be sure what I think about this. Inter-sexual mammals are so rare that it's difficult to come to much of a conclusion.

The question of gender is a different one. Gender is a psychological orientation. First, it's harder to define. If we go with the above theory that there are only two real sexes, it's easy enough to define male and female sex based on genetics (in mammals, the presence of a Y chromosome causes male sex, regardless of how many X chromosomes are present), or on the presence of testes vs ovaries, etc. Either way, it's pretty straightforward compared with gender.

What is the definition of male gender? Does the male gender hog the remote, watch TV, drink beer, burp and fart? Does the male gender choose females as mates? Is the male gender good at fixing broken things, but helpless when asked to cook a meal? I consider myself male, but I don't meet every one of the above (stereotypical) criteria. Is there any single defining characteristic of the male gender that unites all who identify with it?

Then there are the other genders besides male and female. Like the idea of "butch," which are "women" (usually "butches" are lesbians) who identify as "male" in many ways and even sometimes ask to be referred to with male pronouns. Or how about my professor of neurobiology, an M.D., Ph.D. professor at Stanford who underwent gender reassignment surgery and is now indistinguishable from any other man on the street until you sample his DNA and find that there's no Y chromosome? This isn't some crazy person or some moral deviant. I know because I worked with him and took a class from him and he's one of the most down-to-earth, friendly, and intelligent people I know. I identify with him as a man, even though I was a boy growing up and he wasn't.

Or that woman I saw with a goatee one day walking around the streets of San Francisco. I wonderr how she would classify her gender? Most women would shave it off and get it waxed or otherwise hide it. Why didn't this one?

So it gets really complicated, yes.

-Mike

Certified Mad Doctor and HoP High Priest of Nutella



A buckuht n a hooze! -Valura

Posted: 15th Mar 2003
An interesting debate indeed

IMHO..... gender perception in modern day society is widley used as a a stereotype and add teachers voice: we all now what happens when people start using stereotypes don't we?
Our world is one where we and everything in it is ceated from our own perception based on our imagination. How we percieve ourselves, the world, Rita, Bob and Sue too. Our imagination is built up from everything that we have done, seen, read, tasted, felt, etc in our lives so far.

It's the mix of DNA, X & Y, at the moment of our conception that dictate what physicallity we have, and how we interact with the everything & how the everything interacts with us builds up pictures in our imagination of who we are, what everything else is, and the rest. In the past there has always been a very strong image of what male and female meant: not just a physicallity, but a mentality, behavioural pattern etc. In recent times with the general society wanting to put everyone in their box people have realised that not everyone fits into a nice pre-packaged box, and so people have been looking outside the box and realised that there are infinte alternatives.

Gender is no more than what you're packing downstairs, & it's up to us what we do with what we aer given. At this point may I take a moment to say a special 'Hey there' to all the ladies on HoP.


"Our bodies are given life from nothingness, existing where there is nothing is the meaning of the phrase "form is emptiness" That all things are provided by nothingness is the meaning of the phrase," emptiness is form." one should not think these are two separate things." from Hitokage (& an old signature of PK, cheers for the intro to that book! )
Edit: for special Hey there

[ 16. March 2003, 08:35: Message edited by: FireMorph ]

Posted: 15th Mar 2003

quote:

---

Originally posted by FireMorph:
Gender is no more than what you're packing downstairs,

---

No, it is much much more then that. Mike already beat me to saying what I was going to say so just read the post above yours.

I often wonder how much your sex determines your gender and how much society determines your gender. They say on average females are weaker then men but shouldn't that be expected when on average they only engage in a quarter of the physical activitys of men? I realize there is a biological diffrence and a inactive guy may have more upper body strength then a very active athletic woman just because of the way his body is built. But maybe there is less of a biological diffrence then we are lead to believe. A lot of the studies are using statistics to determine the diffrences between men and women. But statistics don't tell you if the diffrences were caused by biology or by society. I tend to think men and women are much more similar then most people think.

Posted: 15th Mar 2003
Judging by the current converstaion it depends if you're a masculine or feminine cuttlefish I think Charles.

Meh

Posted: 16th Mar 2003
When I made my comment about the Hermaphrodites, I was talking about the worms. They are hermaphrodites and they are abundant around here.

Posted: 16th Mar 2003
Astar, my post might not have been clear, I was trying to say that gender can be determined biologically by 'what we're packing downstairs' but not neccesarily by anything else, ie the way someone dresses, thinks, acts, chooses to live. If a human with female packaging percieves themselves as a male in a females body then he/she is refering to 'male' as societies perception of a male.


Edit:sp

[ 17. March 2003, 15:38: Message edited by: FireMorph ]

Posted: 16th Mar 2003
It's a lot easier if you us established and accepted definitions. In which case sex would be the correct term for what you are talking about.

Posted: 17th Mar 2003
Funny thought:
What if Malcolm wanted to find out if his visitors were equally split amongst the boy/girl divide. Easy enough to do a poll, but obviously he wouldn't want to use the word seex as that'd make the site rate higher on search engines for p0rn and 'swinging' sites, and block it on some Net Nanny software. So he used the word gender.

However, the HoP boards denizens being what they are, made even the use of the word 'gender' an issue and debate. It's a funny old board.

So the poll tells us one of several things:
a) More guys spin poi.
b) Guys are more likely to spend time on a poi website than girls.
c) Guys are more likely to respond to polls than girls
d) HoP members love a good discussion, and will happily rant on about anything.

I'm going for option D. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining and I'm a ranter myself. I'm just commenting on a rant with a rant.

Hmmm, "time for bed" said Zeebedee

Posted: 17th Mar 2003
Pedant

Meh

Posted: 18th Mar 2003
Dom...you rock! Both your posts had me giggling.

I agree that the poll is best as it stands, to get a more accurate cross section count, based on the assumption that everyone who has responded has done so only once and in truth. Though I will say this is an interesting debate that I am enjoying reading.

I have known some trans' in my life, and I know that while they had the parts, if they could raise the money they would have changed them. Unlike the cross dressers who liked having man parts, some who were straight, some who were gay but they all say they feel definately female. So then, where would they fit? Physically, they enjoyed being male. Mentally they enjoyed being female. Talk about having your cake! Best of both worlds! Cool fashion with easy aim!

I do not understand this though. I won't even pretend to. I am a girl with all the parts and proud of it.

Pele
Higher, higher burning fire...making music like a choir
"Oooh look! A pub!" -exclaimed after recovering from a stupid fall
"And for the decadence of art, nothing beats a roaring fire." -TMK

Posted: 19th Mar 2003
Of course I rock! I've got the Spandex jump suits, glittery V guitar, back combed hair and an 18 inch high stonehenge.

Posted: 19th Mar 2003
Dom, stop bragging about your 18-incher.

-Mike

Certified Mad Doctor and HoP High Priest of Nutella



A buckuht n a hooze! -Valura