Timeline for What is a ‘woman'?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
10 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Sep 5 at 17:02 | comment | added | Ted Wrigley | @JuliusHamilton: The problem here is that it's often hard to tell who's on the right side of this tension. Is the person claiming to be a different gender mistaken, problematic, or actually doing something 'bad'? Or is the person criticizing them merely another bully trying to impose an unwanted and inappropriate social category to assert power? This dispute isn't helped by the clear bullies (the people who scream that transgendered people are creeps or groomers or other nasty labels). Nor is it helped by those on the other side who demand that there is no difference to see or discuss. | |
| Sep 5 at 16:52 | comment | added | Ted Wrigley | @JuliusHamilton: There's an endless tension between what we think of ourselves and what society thinks of us, a tension we try to relieve by bringing our self-perception and society's perception of us into alignment. Sex and gender identity are just a small portion of this. On one side, we want society to think we are good, competent, trustworthy, strong, capable, etc. On the other side, society wants us to conform, and is willing to punish us if we don't. The hardest position to be in is to be 'different'; one has to convince society that one can be different and good, and that's hard. | |
| Sep 5 at 16:47 | comment | added | Ted Wrigley | @JuliusHamilton: Another thing we know is that these social categories are frequently imposed and challenged; that they are dialectical. A clear example is the typical middle-school bully, who calls people names (i.e., applies unwanted social categories, usually things like 'gay', 'ugly', 'stupid', 'puny'…). It then becomes a power dynamic: the bully calling names, the victim denying them, the threat of violence (accept the label or get punched), the reaction from the social community… | |
| Sep 5 at 16:36 | comment | added | Ted Wrigley | @JuliusHamilton: First, one thing we know for sure is that 'woman' and ;man' are social categories. The are words used in language to signify groups of people with distinct attributes and roles in society. The question isn't whether these terms represent social categories; they do. The question is whether (and how much) these social categories represent ontological differences. Some people want to say they are strongly based in ontology; some that they are weakly based, some that they are entirely epiphenomenal. | |
| Sep 5 at 16:28 | comment | added | Ted Wrigley | @JuliusHamilton: apologies, I somehow missed these comments when they were made. Not sure what happened there… I'll address them quickly, and then spend some time considering whether revisions would be useful. | |
| Jan 7 at 7:32 | comment | added | Julius Hamilton | I’d like to see this answer developed a bit. It only answers the question a little bit. ’Woman' and 'man' are social categories founded on innate biological differences. How do you know? How do you know these words denote “social categories”, and not, say, something else? What if I said gender is completely determined by biology? How can you show that your definition is justified to the exclusion of all others? | |
| Dec 21, 2023 at 13:10 | comment | added | Julius Hamilton | I question that argument. I would like to see people derive the conclusion that, for example, “someone would be enraged if I suggested that they ‘just’ identify as a Christian”, rather than use that as a background assumption. A similar argument builds on the belief that it is deeply offensive to “misgender” someone. I haven’t heard people analyze, or “problematize”, that claim, and I think there are examples that could show it’s not universally true. | |
| Dec 21, 2023 at 13:06 | comment | added | Julius Hamilton | I haven’t taken the time to fully absorb or respond to your post, but I wanted to suggest one point of discussion. I think the concept of “to identify” has gotten reified, where it is common to hear people assert that this is a universal category of human existence. It is often assumed that the way you identify is of major psychological, emotional, social, and therefore moral, import. A very common “moral argument by symmetry” is that it would be starkly untenable to deny certain kinds of identity; therefore, it logically follows to never question any kind of identity. | |
| Dec 18, 2023 at 23:45 | history | edited | Ted Wrigley | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Dec 18, 2023 at 16:39 | history | answered | Ted Wrigley | CC BY-SA 4.0 |