Femininity

[Like Ra]

OK, another serious reading required 😊

Side note: I like that we agree on https://www.likera.com/forum/mybb/Thread...8#pid41668 😉 That image reminded me about another "femininity feature"...

[no smile]

Yeah, sorry but I wanted to have my argument so you could understand my point.

And I don't think we disagree that lot on the aesthetic part but mainly on the "women only" part 😉

BTW, I noticed the latest smiley is not the one I wanted : there are two smilies with the same definition :

PHP Code:

:blush: 


the one you can see on the left panel of the full reply, and another one on the left side of the "get more" panel...

[princesitanatty]

No smile: I do not imply a woman has to wear heels or makeup or shave to be feminine. I said those traits are feminine (female-typical, that is, traits that are usual in women and unusual in men). A specific person has a specific combination of sex-typical, sex-atypical, and sex-unrelated traits. So a woman might be feminine in other traits, without being feminine in those ones. Also, a woman might be masculine in several traits. The value of being feminine or masculine in a specific trait depends on who is making the evaluation.
I disagree with your claim that there is no clear scientific definition of biological sex. There is a clear scientific definition, but a minority of people (less than 1%) is included in a third category (intersex).

[Like Ra]

There is a clear scientific definition, but a minority of people (less than 1%) is included in a third category (intersex).

I thought that the intersex percentage is much less, than 1%, but a simple search says "up to 1.7%":

The original paper (which is usually quoted) is from 2000: https://doi.org/10.1002/(SICI)1520-6300(...3.0.CO;2-F

The Wiki provides more detailed stats: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex#P...on_figures

Stats by ISNA: https://isna.org/faq/frequency/

This is what IHRA says: https://ihra.org.au/16601/intersex-numbers/

"We have seen estimates range from 1 in 1,500 or 2,000 births to 4%, and we recommend an upper bound figure of 1.7%, despite its flaws. This was published by Blackless and others in the American Journal of Human Biology, and also by Anne Fausto-Sterling, Professor of Biology and Gender Studies at Brown University in the US. No more accurate sources of data yet exist."

The value of being feminine or masculine in a specific trait depends on who is making the evaluation.

That's why I asked: "But what is femininity for you? How would you define it? Any examples? Photos? Drawings? What is "utter feminine" in your opinion?" 😉

[no smile]

So we are back to the original question I did not understood after 8 pages of discussion  😁

No smile: I do not imply a woman has to wear heels or makeup or shave to be feminine. I said those traits are feminine (female-typical, that is, traits that are usual in women and unusual in men).

Ok, sorry for the misunderstanding.

The value of being feminine or masculine in a specific trait depends on who is making the evaluation.

I completely agree, that's exactly what I said.  I just misunderstood your post, used as example.

There is a clear scientific definition, but a minority of people (less than 1%) is included in a third category (intersex).

If this definition was that clear, why would we have so much birth-assigned sex problem on intersex people?  Because nobody recognise the intersex category and for some reason, we desperately want only 2 sets, so no, it's not clear.  You have subset of definition like, the dna definition, with exceptions like XXY, ... ), the gonadal definition (again with exception), the morphological definition (again, with exception).  And these definitions does not always agree with the others.  So we add a category for what we don't know how to treat it.

My point is that there is no scientific definition of 2 sets being perfectly defined without exception as our societies pretend the reality is.  And therefore, the gender construction over 2 so called unique sex cannot be legitimate since every definition accept the fact there is at least one more category.

(And yeah, we are again diverging  😁 )

[Like Ra]

And yeah, we are again diverging 

Let's reframe it to: we are widening the base of the original discussion 😉

[princesitanatty]

There is a clear scientific definition, but a minority of people (less than 1%) is included in a third category (intersex).

I thought that the intersex percentage is much less, than 1%, but a simple search says "up to 1.7%":

The original paper (which is usually quoted) is from 2000: https://doi.org/10.1002/(SICI)1520-6300(...3.0.CO;2-F

The Wiki provides more detailed stats: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex#P...on_figures

Stats by ISNA: https://isna.org/faq/frequency/

This is what IHRA says: https://ihra.org.au/16601/intersex-numbers/

"We have seen estimates range from 1 in 1,500 or 2,000 births to 4%, and we recommend an upper bound figure of 1.7%, despite its flaws. This was published by Blackless and others in the American Journal of Human Biology, and also by Anne Fausto-Sterling, Professor of Biology and Gender Studies at Brown University in the US. No more accurate sources of data yet exist."

The value of being feminine or masculine in a specific trait depends on who is making the evaluation.

That's why I asked: "But what is femininity for you? How would you define it? Any examples? Photos? Drawings? What is "utter feminine" in your opinion?" 😉

Fausto-Sterling's number includes sex conditions that are not "intersexual" in the usual sense of this word, and that's the reason why it's more than 1%. Of course, a change in the definition of the word will change the number of its instances. Here you can read Sax's criticism of Fausto-Sterling's number: https://www.leonardsax.com/how-common-is...-sterling/

[princesitanatty]

So we are back to the original question I did not understood after 8 pages of discussion  😁

No smile: I do not imply a woman has to wear heels or makeup or shave to be feminine. I said those traits are feminine (female-typical, that is, traits that are usual in women and unusual in men).

Ok, sorry for the misunderstanding.

The value of being feminine or masculine in a specific trait depends on who is making the evaluation.

I completely agree, that's exactly what I said.  I just misunderstood your post, used as example.

There is a clear scientific definition, but a minority of people (less than 1%) is included in a third category (intersex).

If this definition was that clear, why would we have so much birth-assigned sex problem on intersex people?  Because nobody recognise the intersex category and for some reason, we desperately want only 2 sets, so no, it's not clear.  You have subset of definition like, the dna definition, with exceptions like XXY, ... ), the gonadal definition (again with exception), the morphological definition (again, with exception).  And these definitions does not always agree with the others.  So we add a category for what we don't know how to treat it.

My point is that there is no scientific definition of 2 sets being perfectly defined without exception as our societies pretend the reality is.  And therefore, the gender construction over 2 so called unique sex cannot be legitimate since every definition accept the fact there is at least one more category.

(And yeah, we are again diverging  😁 )

I agree we have problems, but that does not mean that we do not have a clear scientific definition. Instead, I think it means that having a clear scientific definition is not the only problem we must solve. We also must solve assessment problems, treatment problems, and sociocultural problems.
I define "gender" as a multiple-trait bipolar spectrum, so I do not adopt the gender dichotomy model that you are describing and rejecting. Anyway, I think our models differ.

[no smile]

I'm not sure they are so diverging. I first take the dichotomous model as base because it's the common acceptance. But at the end, I completely remove the barriers between the "two worlds"... What's your opinion about it?

And I therefore have a question, how do you place/define masculinity and feminity in such model?

[princesitanatty]

I'm not sure they are so diverging.  I first take the dichotomous model as base because it's the common acceptance.  But at the end, I completely remove the barriers between the "two worlds"...  What's your opinion about it?

And I therefore have a question, how do you place/define masculinity and feminity in such model?

I define masculinity-femininity as a bipolar spectrum of sex-typicality in a set of traits. Some traits change their sex-typicality in different cultures and times, other traits have the same sex-typicality in different cultures and times.