Come on, don’t be shy. Spell it out instead of just dropping hints and poking fun. You do actually seem to be saying that printing funny money, bombing people, and selling snake oil are the only worthwhile pursuits, and women need to get with the programme. Surely there must be more to your life philosophy than that?
Yeah, I know it’s not a competition. It’s kinda irritating when people won’t even attempt to defend their views though.
Didn’t say it was. But the fact that many jobs which were performed exclusively by men in the past are even occasionally performed by women is a major change, as is the tendency for women to work in paying jobs at all. Our social reality is definitely changing in that way.
My observation wasn’t that trivial. My point was that we all have some innate and timeless concept of what is appropriate male and female attire, and men and women enjoy conforming to those concepts. It’s very hard to pin it down to details - a fashion designer might be able to - but it’s there.
No doubt it’s there, as I recognized.
Simply so that they can pick an appropriate mode of address
Of direct address? I guess this is a joke.
Not yet, no.
In that case, I don’t understand what you mean.
A certain amount of removal of choices makes people feel comfortable. Up to a point. This has been well-studied. When people are given too many choices they get upset.
So we should deny choices to people? How happy has that been found to make people?
I probably could get angsty if I wanted. I’m, erm, not very male. I hate football, cars, and cricket. I get along better in female company than I do with men. I don’t like jumping off cliffs, getting drunk and starting fights. OTOH I’m absolutely certain that I am male and enjoy being male. A lot. I do various things that define me quite clearly as male. However, if I listened too hard to too much bullshit, I might start asking myself stupid questions about my gender. I might think that, because I’m a bit off-centre, I need a new pronoun. Fortunately, I’m a reactionary old bastard and I don’t have time for such nonsense.
Those things vary. It doesn’t matter whether you meet anyone’s preconceived notions of what is important for your gender. You are being what you want to be in the end, no? And if you did ask yourself stupid questions, what would be the big deal? FWIW, I don’t like jumping off cliffs either. With or without that stretchy book cord thing. I never liked those anyway. Get a bag. I like getting drunk though.
This is not denial. It’s a realisation that one’s identity depends to a large extent on others. No man, woman, or genderless person is an island.
Sure. I’m reading a great book now that talks about this kind of thing, The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt. Well worth looking up if you haven’t. Having said that, individuality is a thing as well, and some people prefer that path.
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Wasn’t there any kaoliang. You’d think that’s be enough.
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Apparently, when you drink the gaoliang you get even more of the yellow stuff.
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Just as long as I don’t have to sip it from those little cups.
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If history teaches us anything, it’s that Zod never wins.
As it turns out.
Why on earth would I need/want/care to “defend” my views?
What is this, a discussion??
Pretty sure that, whatever the exact opposite of a discussion is, this is it.
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Not at all. A lot of ambiguously-gendered people pick one team or the other, partly (perhaps) so that they can rub along peaceably with other people. If a smaller subset thinks it’s amusing to watch the average man in the street struggle to find the right words to convey basic human respect - which most will want to do - that’s their own lookout.
I’m simply saying it’s counterproductive to make yourself look deliberately ambiguous in public, even if you want to be ambiguous in the privacy of your own head.
The modern cultural meme is that everything is up for grabs, even pregnancy. We’re promised that real soon now men will also be able to carry a child to term. I seem to remember it has actually been done in limited ways. I’m just pointing out ways in which hard distinctions between the two genders are being eroded for no obvious benefit.
I said “up to a point”. I was amazed to discover that lesbians come in several different flavours [insert locker-room observations here], which must make life incredibly difficult if you’re a lesbian. How the hell are you supposed to find a partner who’s not just gay, but your particular type of gay? I suppose in this case it is what it is - the number of options is not up for debate - but I reckon the “choices” available there are a bit problematic to say the least.
As I said earlier, the number of people who are genuinely neuter must be vanishingly small, with everyone else having at least a modest tendency towards maleness or femaleness. Exaggerating that tendency for the sake of public appearances is going to hurt no-one, just as it’s not going to hurt me to wear a business suit or watch a football match occasionally.
I was suggesting that people with a weak sense of self - which is relatively common - might ask those questions and come up with wrong answers.
Just ordered it - I like that sort of thing, and I’ve run out of stuff to read.
Then they must accept that individuality comes with a price - not because other people are deliberately mean and inconsiderate, but just because that’s the way the world works. For example if I flat-out refuse to ever wear a suit, I’m excluding myself from a lot of situations which I might otherwise enjoy. That insistence on individuality is likely to make me less happy overall. I wonder if there’s some component of self-flagellation going on in the minds of people who go to great lengths to portray themselves as outsiders?
I’ve tried to understand your points, but cannot. So, simply, is your point that LGBT, or neuter or what ever, should not be allowed?
Some Indians think it’s good for you, because yoga.
Like Gatorade, it replaces all your bodily fluids!
The Chinese adherents believe it strengthens the immune system and treats endocrine disorders. Skoal!
And, with perfect timing:
It’s that damned patriarchy again. Is there anything it isn’t responsible for?
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Guess all those men who shave are oppressed by the patriarchy as well.
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In modern feminist theory the patriarchy oppresses men and women. Like so many things these days it’s a social construct. You’re oppressed, I’m oppressed, everyone’s oppressed. Not sure who’s doing the oppressing.
Back to Finley’s comment about having lots of body hair. Frankly, nobody is going to feel good about having lots of body hair outside of fetish groups.
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Some posters might disagree…
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Was that directed at me? The reply thingy doesn’t seem to work very well.
After all my rambling, my point was fairly simple: if you don’t feel that you’re entirely male or female, just get over yourself and (a) pick a pronoun and (b) try to convey your preferred pronoun via signals that everyone can pick up.
Nobody cares these days if you are biologically male but believe yourself to be female, or anything in between. Most people can cope with the idea of calling someone “she” even though, technically speaking, she’s not. So why not just accept that that works and move on?
The proposed alternative - inventing more pronouns - cannot logically work unless everyone walks around with little sticky labels on their heads, which is just stupid. Do you have another proposal that would actually work in practice?
I don’t really see how gender-neutral people could be “disallowed”, can you?
The term “LGBT” is related to sexuality rather than gender identity, so I’m not sure it’s relevant here.
Facial topiary for men has always been a thing. As for hair elsewhere, I suppose there’s a happy medium - nobody wants to look like the yeti. Even so, there’s a sock for every hole, or whatever Icon’s expression is. 
If you have nothing better to do, here’s an article on the subject:
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I haven’t been able to really form a good well thought out opinion on trans/nonbinary gender. I don’t doubt that there are people who feel like their body’s biology doesn’t match with how they feel on the inside, but is this a real cause to say gender is a social construct or is it that these people may have a mental disorder (which I don’t mean in a negative way)
But to the language part of picking pronouns, I feel like it’s really impractical and we already see it and thats why we haven’t all caught on with it unless we are forced to. And it’s not even that people are bigoted and want to offend someone, it’s just unless we literally have what pronouns we want to refer to on our forehead , it’s just super impractical. He or she isn’t meant to be offensive, it doesn’t have a history of being used in that way until people found it. So for everyone to have to change it to spare a few peoples feelings when it’s not happening organically and naturally doesn’t seem to make sense.
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In 47 years I’ve yet to meet anyone who asked me to refer to them using a non-standard pronoun. If it ever happens I will do as they ask. I have a feeling it won’t. This involves a tiny percentage of the population who appear to be much larger because of the internet.
Has anyone on here ever actually met someone who requested a different pronoun?
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Most transgender people I know usually want to stay low key about things in my experience. I just use he if the person is clearly trying to look like a man and the other way around.
I’ve actually heard some trans people get upset about people bringing all of this up like gender neutral bathroom and pronouns. They said it actually made things harder on them when they just want to fit in and not already draw more attention.
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