Is gender a social construct?

[Cosmos]

Have not gone through all the valuable insights in this thread yet, but will do so in a short while. From what I've gathered so far from this thread, as well as the other threads about Jordan Petersons work and what he exposes, it almost seems to me that this "gender is a social construct" is just one of the latest attempts from the PTB (in the higher realm sense) to take control of as much people as possible, by tempting large numbers of people to believe in obvious lies. It also seems to me that things like these might be "designed" to a certain extent to make people submit to loose the seed of a soul, or in other words, adopt psychopathic thinking a la "I create reality and see only this".

It also strikes me that the very idea we are talking about, is so seriously wrong in any way you look at it, and still large numbers of people just follow this. I also thought how very similar this is in essence to the flat earth thinking. It kind of looks to me like a temptation that exist for people to loose their sanity, and maybe ultimately their conscience/soul.
Also the C's "ultimate soul smashing event " comes to mind here. Maybe it is exactly things like these, they were talking about? Not saying that this is "the event", just one of the many areas that could be associated with it happening right now. I'm also reminded, that besides this "lefty" insanity, there is also the "righty" insanity in place for the other parts of the people. It seems if you fall for either extreme course, of anti reality/humanity thinking, you run into serious danger.

I'm also reminded about Joe's recent focus and how this left right trap is very effective and only very few seems to navigate that mess with their faculties still intact:

The Muzzies Are Coming! Adopt a Refugee!

Jordan Peterson Destroys SJW Professor on Gender Pronouns and Censorship
Published on Nov 21, 2016

http://<iframe width="560" height="...88" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

I watched that one recently too and I was so utterly bewildered on what I saw and heard there from this "professor" and the moderator, that I can only describe it as surreal in the extreme. I can't believe that something like this actually exist, but here we are and there are actually people who live in that made up reality and push others into it.

 

[Beau]

I don't know if y'all have read it yet, but there is an excellent SOTT Focus right now on this: The demise of Western Civilization: "Gender fluidity" as a harbinger for Postmodernist Hell. I highly recommend it.

Having read it and watched the Jordan Peterson videos embedded, it seems to me that this whole issue of a society "constructing" a gender is complete nonsense and the emergence of forced speech legislation is very dangerous to all of us, including transgendered individuals. There are so many contradictions and selection of substitution of data in the SJW arguments that it really drives home the danger of allowing oneself to believe in the lies being promulgated by that small section of Western society so influenced by post-modern thinking.

One example of contradiction, and the danger it brings, that Peterson brings up is how so many people believe that gay conversion therapy is immoral, because if people are born that way there is no way they can be "converted" back to being heterosexual. I think we can all agree about that. I know this is specifically about sexual orientation, but it's a slippery slope and I think Peterson understands why this whole issue is so problematic from a legislative point of view. But anyway, if the prevailing notion now is that one's sexuality is not in fact something one is born with but something that is constructed by society, then what's to stop from people being forced to undergo gay conversion therapy?

What's to stop the vast majority of society alienating these people because they resent being forced to act and speak a certain way to avoid being arrested? That is basically what Theryn Meyer, a transgender activist, is talking about when she says that bill C-16 in Canada will do the opposite of what it's intended:

http://<iframe width="560" height="...fs" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

[Joe]

Kind of repeating what has already been said, but perhaps in a slightly different way: It might help to see "sex" as the strictly physical/biological/objective side of the equation, and "gender" as the conscious/subjective side. (Objective as in a physical object to be observed, and subjective as in a subject that experiences and observes.)

Sex is what parts you have, and all the other physical characteristics unique to one sex or the other. For example, genitals, grip strength, facial hair, overall build, brain differences, hormones, etc. Gender (to borrow a phrase from Tom Nagel) is what it feels like to be a man or woman. That brings in elements of behavior, roles, and consciousness/subjectivity.

Many specific male and female roles and behaviors are culturally conditioned, but on a more general level, the roles seem rooted in biology. Similar to language, the unique sound combinations of which are conditioned by history and culture, but which are rooted in meanings shared by all humans (for the most part - some words don't translate, but overall translation is possible).

For example, biological differences seem to influence many behavioral gender role differences, from temperament to mating strategies, among many others. And the Swedish experiments Peterson talks about come into play here too.

That applies to 99%+ of the population, with some variations. For example, not ALL women are more agreeable than men, but statistically, they're more likely to be. There are always outliers on any individual trait. Also, not all women marry men at or above their socioeconomic "level", but the vast majority do.

But that is now how some of these people use the term gender, to them it is effectively a 'third' (or fourth or fifth) "biological sex", including the non-descript "neither male nor female". The 'gender fluidity' business in general seems to be defined by MASSIVE subjectivity, validation of which is to be forced on the general population. The question then is: 'can we ALL have our most subjective imaginings validated in the same way?' But wait, apparently the majority of the population would never want anyone to indulge them in such an extreme and, frankly inappropriate, way.

 

[Joe]

Interesting thread! Some thoughts:

I think some of the confusion can be traced to the fact that, on the one hand, there ARE or HAVE BEEN cultures with more than two genders. So clearly we cannot equate gender with sex. But it is also a fact that there are strong biological underpinnings to gender.

All cultures have men who feel like women and women who feel like men. This is not "gender", it is "feeling" that leads to behavior. I have feelings too that lead to behavior. What gender designation shall we give that? And then we'll make up one for every single human being that also has their own subjective feelings about their sex/gender that lead to particular behaviors. The point being, there is a spectrum of male and female behavior. There are "manly men" and "effeminate men" and the same for women, and everything in between. So-called "non-binary" people are simply somewhere (probably further to one or other extreme) on that existing spectrum. They can be added to it in the same unofficial way that the other categories are, but the idea that they should co-opt the term "gender" by reducing "maleness" and "femaleness" to two simplistic 'types' and then add themselves as another 'type' is, as the saying goes, not even wrong.

 

[hlat]

I'm thinking about this on two levels. The main level is nuts and bolts, that man and woman have biological traits and that reality is something we can touch, feel, observe.

The other level is reality is illusion, matter is not real and quantum physics, that 4D can go to sleep as a man and wake up a woman and all there is is lessons.

I think people need to master the nuts and bolts level first before attempting to take on the other level that reality is illusion. Third gender or genders beyond man and woman seem to be escaping from this reality instead of dealing with reality and mastering reality. It seems postmodernism is here escaping reality and denying reality exists.

On the level of reality is illusion, maybe it is correct that the soul has no sex or gender and we have been reincarnated as human many times as man or woman. This level is a maze and makes no sense when reality has not been mastered first.

I think humans are binary, either man or woman, maybe with occasional overlap or underlap. Maybe some nonhumans from another world have more than two sexes or gender, and without data that idea is not part of this reality.

In this reality, it seems the ideologies that offer protection are those that protect the free will of individuals against forced actions that a group or government mandate. Vaccines are a prime example. I would rather see parents deciding for children than outsiders or government deciding for children, recognizing that it is not perfect and many or most parents do not try to do what is best for their children. Government force is a brute, dumb power and I think this kind of power has no place in regulating sensitive feelings and being offended.

 

[caballero reyes]

It seems that it is relegating to the background the most immediate and important for each: The Sexual attraction.

I think that the attraction that is felt by someone at any given time and depending on the strength of this attraction, is above any present theory, past or future.

 

[Mr. Premise]

Interesting thread! Some thoughts:

I think some of the confusion can be traced to the fact that, on the one hand, there ARE or HAVE BEEN cultures with more than two genders. So clearly we cannot equate gender with sex. But it is also a fact that there are strong biological underpinnings to gender.

What cultures are those? And what are the "more than two genders"?

I am aware that many cultures throughout history have accepted gays and have had special terms for them that are often, but not always, pejorative, but none, so far as I am aware, actually consider them another "gender."

Well genders, I think, are cultural roles based on sex. So for some cultures it can be binary (male-female) but that can lead to mistreatment of homosexuals, for example.

Also, it is interesting that the older Indo-European languages had three genders: masculine, feminine, and neuter. Maybe because of rearing of livestock, where there are different terms for castrated male animals (bulls vs. steers, for example). And several historical cultures had eunuchs or castrati, which had different cultural expectations, which could be seen as gender. Plus, if there are two binary oppositions, they combine into four quadrants. So even in our culture, we might see four genders based on two binary oppositions: male-female, and attracted to males and attracted to females.

But being aware of different ways cultures deal with these things doesn't mean subscribing to proliferation of different pronouns and voluntary identification of personal idiosyncratic gender categories. I think there's a middle road here.

Color is an example. Some cultures didn't differentiate between blue and green, or red and orange. There is an underlying reality of wavelengths of light, but cultures can divide them up in different ways.

 

[Ina]

Very interesting thread. :)

My understanding of the problem.

To the original question one possible answer would be, what happens to gender in notion and application in the absence of society. Early on in the thread Laura brought the superb example of the study in Norway which suggests that gender could be regarded as a stand alone notion, not being dependent on society to validate it in order to exist. What about society? Is society a natural or an artificial construct? Adrian Bejan in Constructal Theory of Social Dynamics, proposes society as a dynamic structure, that evolved from simple to complex following hierarchy patterns similar to ones found in nature (tree branch network, leaf type organization etc), calling that natural hierarchy. In this light the notion of gender would appear as a different specialization, having functional meaning only in relation to other complementary specialization. Would hierarchy have something to contribute to the utilization of genders, certainly should rules be imposed, that affect their understanding of functionality. For an individual, it might seem ludicrous to be associated with the above model of existence so it seems that it is a matter of own choice the type or manner of functional integration simply based on gender. It is up to the informed individual to decide whether to follow or use the natural or artificial optimization rules that society presents as developmental guidelines at any given time.

Cheers
Ina

 

[Seppo Ilmarinen]

Interesting thread! Some thoughts:

I think some of the confusion can be traced to the fact that, on the one hand, there ARE or HAVE BEEN cultures with more than two genders. So clearly we cannot equate gender with sex. But it is also a fact that there are strong biological underpinnings to gender.

What cultures are those? And what are the "more than two genders"?

I am aware that many cultures throughout history have accepted gays and have had special terms for them that are often, but not always, pejorative, but none, so far as I am aware, actually consider them another "gender."

Well genders, I think, are cultural roles based on sex. So for some cultures it can be binary (male-female) but that can lead to mistreatment of homosexuals, for example.

Also, it is interesting that the older Indo-European languages had three genders: masculine, feminine, and neuter. Maybe because of rearing of livestock, where there are different terms for castrated male animals (bulls vs. steers, for example). And several historical cultures had eunuchs or castrati, which had different cultural expectations, which could be seen as gender. Plus, if there are two binary oppositions, they combine into four quadrants. So even in our culture, we might see four genders based on two binary oppositions: male-female, and attracted to males and attracted to females.

But being aware of different ways cultures deal with these things doesn't mean subscribing to proliferation of different pronouns and voluntary identification of personal idiosyncratic gender categories. I think there's a middle road here.

Color is an example. Some cultures didn't differentiate between blue and green, or red and orange. There is an underlying reality of wavelengths of light, but cultures can divide them up in different ways.

I don't understand the premise that there being two sexes/genders could lead mistreatment of homosexuals. How does adding new artificial gender counter this? Society giving acceptance (e.g that it's a small minority which shouldn't be persecuted) and perhaps some kind of role/purpose to homosexuality (like shamanism in tribal societies) doesn't require adding new genders. It only requires psychologically healthy society.

(It's not some cultures that define sex as binary, it's vast majority of all population ever lived.)

I don't see castration as good example of "third gender". It's basically mutilation of genitals, which has consequences to human body, like lowered testosterone levels and other hormonal dysfunctions. Why call result of this process a gender? For example kidney removal will also have consequences to human body in similar manner (hormonal system dysfunctions etc.), but we don't invent a new gender to describe these individuals.

Culture can divide/define anything in a any different ways, but this only means that some ways are more objective than others. Maybe a society decides that there's only one color and creates fancy theory to support this claim - doesn't mean it's equally correct.

 

[shijing]

Also, it is interesting that the older Indo-European languages had three genders: masculine, feminine, and neuter. Maybe because of rearing of livestock, where there are different terms for castrated male animals (bulls vs. steers, for example). And several historical cultures had eunuchs or castrati, which had different cultural expectations, which could be seen as gender.

I just wanted to note that it may be difficult to make a strong argument about cultural gender constructs using grammatical gender, although the fact that the term 'gender' is used in both cases leads people to conclude that they are directly related. I believe there's a general consensus that Proto-Indo-European grammatical gender categories were originally based on an animacy distinction, not on a biological opposition. There was an original two-way distinction between what later came to be regarded as the masculine ( < animate) and neuter ( < inanimate) categories, with the feminine category being a historically later development. The paper linked below provides a decent summary:

http://allegatifac.unipv.it/silvialuraghi/Gender%20FoL.pdf

 

[Joe]

Well genders, I think, are cultural roles based on sex. So for some cultures it can be binary (male-female) but that can lead to mistreatment of homosexuals, for example.

Well, you might notice that acceptance of homosexuals in Western societies is at an all time high. It seems to me that those pushing the 'transgender' business are pushing too far and at the behest of very suspect groups and are therefore actually working against the continued acceptance of homosexuality in Western societies.

 

[Windmill knight]

One example of contradiction, and the danger it brings, that Peterson brings up is how so many people believe that gay conversion therapy is immoral, because if people are born that way there is no way they can be "converted" back to being heterosexual. I think we can all agree about that. I know this is specifically about sexual orientation, but it's a slippery slope and I think Peterson understands why this whole issue is so problematic from a legislative point of view. But anyway, if the prevailing notion now is that one's sexuality is not in fact something one is born with but something that is constructed by society, then what's to stop from people being forced to undergo gay conversion therapy?

That's a great example. I spent a few years in university dealing with all sorts of flavours of postmodernism in social sciences, and one thing that struck me was how contradictory some could be, even if they were based on similar premises. So different feminists, for example, could reach diametrically opposite conclusions. But of course it had to be that way, cause it's nothing short of cheating and contradictory to declare that everything is a social construct and then proceed to make your own social constructs and demand that everyone should stick to them if they don't want to be considered oppressive!

It took me a couple of years to truly understand one such postmodernist writer, Michel Foucault. In spite of being a historian and supposedly sticking to historical facts, when he theorized he kept on talking about how 'truth' is constructed and used for purposes of power, etc. Well, surely he wasn't talking about the same thing when I thought of 'truth'; if anything, truth would negate manipulations and all such games of power. And isn't there a contradiction in proclaiming that there is more than one truth? The truth is the truth is the truth. But that's not what he was saying.

Eventually I came across some author who explained in a clear and concise way the postmodernist premise: It's not that there is no objective reality out there, he wrote, but that it doesn´t matter. What matters is what is constructed around it! (And that's what Foucault meant by 'truth'.) Well, I got it then, but it annoyed me to the extreme that 1) the big authors hadn't bothered to simply say what they meant; they had to go through tomes of convoluted rhetoric instead; and more importantly 2) the contempt with which they treated the truth. I was after all at university, where science is supposed to be made, and what is the point of science (including the social ones) if not to get to the truth of the matter??

Furthermore, and specifically for political sciences which was my domain, the idea that 'truth doesn't matter, just the narratives' meant that you could never state the simplest and most obvious truth about politics: Politicians lie. Because to declare that someone is lying would be to say that they are speaking against the truth, and who knows that the truth is - furthermore who cares? So if Bush lied about weapons of mass destruction, one could write entire theses about the American mythology and what not, but strangely enough it became rather difficult to state the evident: there was a big lie in there. You almost got the feeling that the people in the academia felt it was a bit 'politically incorrect' (patriarchal? oppressive?) to call anyone a liar! Even Bush!

I've come to the conclusion that postmodernism is ultimately so attractive for two reasons:

1) It allows for a lot of laziness, like someone else mentioned already on this thread. You don't have to get to the truth; you can go and get your degree and feel all important and self-righteous and "enlightened" by practicing armchair philosophy by simply remixing a bunch of obscure ideas. You also don't need to be committed to any cause or ideology.

2) It provides all sorts of excuses for one's own shortcomings. From political apathy to sexual deviations, it's all good as nothing really matters in the end. I suspect that those liberals who so fiercely fight for transgender rights - even more than the transgender people themselves - do so because they are preempting any eventual criticism against whatever they are hiding in their own closets.

Like Jordan Peterson says, people complain about their lives not having any meaning, but the fact is that it is very comfortable because then nothing you do matters. But if life had meaning, then everything you do would matter, and that is a heavy burden to carry! So it's comfier to not have any meaning, and postmodernists can intellectually provide just that comfort. Party on.

 

[Ina]

One example of contradiction, and the danger it brings, that Peterson brings up is how so many people believe that gay conversion therapy is immoral, because if people are born that way there is no way they can be "converted" back to being heterosexual. I think we can all agree about that. I know this is specifically about sexual orientation, but it's a slippery slope and I think Peterson understands why this whole issue is so problematic from a legislative point of view. But anyway, if the prevailing notion now is that one's sexuality is not in fact something one is born with but something that is constructed by society, then what's to stop from people being forced to undergo gay conversion therapy?

That's a great example. I spent a few years in university dealing with all sorts of flavours of postmodernism in social sciences, and one thing that struck me was how contradictory some could be, even if they were based on similar premises. So different feminists, for example, could reach diametrically opposite conclusions. But of course it had to be that way, cause it's nothing short of cheating and contradictory to declare that everything is a social construct and then proceed to make your own social constructs and demand that everyone should stick to them if they don't want to be considered oppressive!

It took me a couple of years to truly understand one such postmodernist writer, Michel Foucault. In spite of being a historian and supposedly sticking to historical facts, when he theorized he kept on talking about how 'truth' is constructed and used for purposes of power, etc. Well, surely he wasn't talking about the same thing when I thought of 'truth'; if anything, truth would negate manipulations and all such games of power. And isn't there a contradiction in proclaiming that there is more than one truth? The truth is the truth is the truth. But that's not what he was saying.

Eventually I came across some author who explained in a clear and concise way the postmodernist premise: It's not that there is no objective reality out there, he wrote, but that it doesn´t matter. What matters is what is constructed around it! (And that's what Foucault meant by 'truth'.) Well, I got it then, but it annoyed me to the extreme that 1) the big authors hadn't bothered to simply say what they meant; they had to go through tomes of convoluted rhetoric instead; and more importantly 2) the contempt with which they treated the truth. I was after all at university, where science is supposed to be made, and what is the point of science (including the social ones) if not to get to the truth of the matter??

Furthermore, and specifically for political sciences which was my domain, the idea that 'truth doesn't matter, just the narratives' meant that you could never state the simplest and most obvious truth about politics: Politicians lie. Because to declare that someone is lying would be to say that they are speaking against the truth, and who knows that the truth is - furthermore who cares? So if Bush lied about weapons of mass destruction, one could write entire theses about the American mythology and what not, but strangely enough it became rather difficult to state the evident: there was a big lie in there. You almost got the feeling that the people in the academia felt it was a bit 'politically incorrect' (patriarchal? oppressive?) to call anyone a liar! Even Bush!

I've come to the conclusion that postmodernism is ultimately so attractive for two reasons:

1) It allows for a lot of laziness, like someone else mentioned already on this thread. You don't have to get to the truth; you can go and get your degree and feel all important and self-righteous and "enlightened" by practicing armchair philosophy by simply remixing a bunch of obscure ideas. You also don't need to be committed to any cause or ideology.

2) It provides all sorts of excuses for one's own shortcomings. From political apathy to sexual deviations, it's all good as nothing really matters in the end. I suspect that those liberals who so fiercely fight for transgender rights - even more than the transgender people themselves - do so because they are preempting any eventual criticism against whatever they are hiding in their own closets.

Like Jordan Peterson says, people complain about their lives not having any meaning, but the fact is that it is very comfortable because then nothing you do matters. But if life had meaning, then everything you do would matter, and that is a heavy burden to carry! So it's comfier to not have any meaning, and postmodernists can intellectually provide just that comfort. Party on.

Comfort zone. Two words that answer the initial question. Thank you for a clear explanation. From now on I shall apply a rigorous time filter in what I do.

 

[Scottie]

Well genders, I think, are cultural roles based on sex. So for some cultures it can be binary (male-female) but that can lead to mistreatment of homosexuals, for example.

Which is weird IMO, because homosexuality is actually within the traditional male/female binary gender thing as far as I'm concerned. You have 2 genders, and sometimes you get MM and FF instead of MF.

Well, you might notice that acceptance of homosexuals in Western societies is at an all time high. It seems to me that those pushing the 'transgender' business are pushing too far and at the behest of very suspect groups and are therefore actually working against the continued acceptance of homosexuality in Western societies.

Yeah, that's what worries me... and not just for homosexuals. It's funny, because I've said some things along these lines on FB, and one of my "friends" from high school seemed to be triggered by it.

The thing is, I wasn't saying anything was bad; I was just saying that if you're a minority, you can't expect special rights. IOW, equality != "I get my own bathroom, and 70 pronouns on FB, and special laws to protect me, etc." The opposite of discrimination against minorities isn't discrimination against the majority - it's real, actual equality. We're not there yet, because these movements always seem to be co-opted and turned into emotion-driver crusades that run way off the tracks.

Equality just means equality. And yet oftentimes, if you say anything along those lines, people freak out. Whenever there is a sort of irrational hysteria in that way, it doesn't bode well.

 

[manitoban]

Have not gone through all the valuable insights in this thread yet, but will do so in a short while. From what I've gathered so far from this thread, as well as the other threads about Jordan Petersons work and what he exposes, it almost seems to me that this "gender is a social construct" is just one of the latest attempts from the PTB (in the higher realm sense) to take control of as much people as possible, by tempting large numbers of people to believe in obvious lies. It also seems to me that things like these might be "designed" to a certain extent to make people submit to loose the seed of a soul, or in other words, adopt psychopathic thinking a la "I create reality and see only this".

It also strikes me that the very idea we are talking about, is so seriously wrong in any way you look at it, and still large numbers of people just follow this. I also thought how very similar this is in essence to the flat earth thinking. It kind of looks to me like a temptation that exist for people to loose their sanity, and maybe ultimately their conscience/soul.
Also the C's "ultimate soul smashing event " comes to mind here. Maybe it is exactly things like these, they were talking about? Not saying that this is "the event", just one of the many areas that could be associated with it happening right now. I'm also reminded, that besides this "lefty" insanity, there is also the "righty" insanity in place for the other parts of the people. It seems if you fall for either extreme course, of anti reality/humanity thinking, you run into serious danger.

I've had very similar thoughts regarding this topic. It seems to me that this is the bottom line here, getting as many people as possible to believe in one of the most basic lies imaginable. The amount of effort the PTB has made to spread this idea surely indicates that there is some reason for it, and it isn't the well being of the people. What is astounding to me is how so many are falling for it, it's kind of like a choice or inability to see reality literally taking over huge numbers of people.