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Discussion: Pansexual?
Member Since: 5/21/2009
Posts: 11,151
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Quote:
Originally posted by orange
I would argue this due to technicality. Gender, itself, is a construct, but one can argue that sex is not. Sex contributes to how one is born or appears when it comes to the sexual parts, whereas gender relates to how one acts. You can be masculine but be born a female, or vice versa.
As for the sex itself, there are people who are born intersex. This can happen either through chromosomes directly, thus not XY (male) or XX (female) but instead XXY. Also, when not looking at chromosomes as the basis for sex, there are people who either have reproductive organs or genitals that do not match completely. Usually if such things happen, the babies are forced into a specific sex, which may not be representative as they grow up, causing them to go through with ways that could change their sex.
If you are not concerned with genes or physical attributes, then there are cases of males or females who end up having more testosterone or estrogen than their same-sex counterparts, which can affect how their gender appears but they may still identify as a specific sex due to their external characteristics. Gender can be quite different in different cultures. It may be masculine to avoid pink here but in a different culture, it may be more masculine to wear pink. Thus, gender would seem like a social construct. It is just that usually people identify with the same gender as their sex, so people confuse the two terms.
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My mistake. I'm thinking gender and sex were synonymous with each other. I understand that sometimes during fetal development chromosomes chemical imbalances can occur and people can be born intersex, but that IMO is an abnormality, although I'm aware probably some radically left person would beg to differ (no shade).
Personally I think reproductive organs decide the sex of the person regardless of how they behave, but I can understand other opinions on that matter.
Great post, though.
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Member Since: 3/3/2011
Posts: 23,567
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Gender just a social construct, eh?
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Member Since: 11/11/2010
Posts: 1,720
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Quote:
Originally posted by orange
I would argue this due to technicality. Gender, itself, is a construct, but one can argue that sex is not. Sex contributes to how one is born or appears when it comes to the sexual parts, whereas gender relates to how one acts. You can be masculine but be born a female, or vice versa.
As for the sex itself, there are people who are born intersex. This can happen either through chromosomes directly, thus not XY (male) or XX (female) but instead XXY. Also, when not looking at chromosomes as the basis for sex, there are people who either have reproductive organs or genitals that do not match completely. Usually if such things happen, the babies are forced into a specific sex, which may not be representative as they grow up, causing them to go through with ways that could change their sex.
If you are not concerned with genes or physical attributes, then there are cases of males or females who end up having more testosterone or estrogen than their same-sex counterparts, which can affect how their gender appears but they may still identify as a specific sex due to their external characteristics. Gender can be quite different in different cultures. It may be masculine to avoid pink here but in a different culture, it may be more masculine to wear pink. Thus, gender would seem like a social construct. It is just that usually people identify with the same gender as their sex, so people confuse the two terms.
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Additionally there are transgendered people who are at varying stages of the transition, and think of themselves as outside of either gender. And even more, there are MANY transexuals who get top surgery (make body APPEAR to be the other gender) while keeping the lower genitalia of their original sex. These are people operating outside of gender norms, and that is why gender has become more complicated.
You are born a certain sex. You do not have to stay the assigned gender, and that is where this discussion takes place.
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ATRL Senior Member
Member Since: 12/29/2003
Posts: 6,311
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Quote:
Originally posted by NE.
My mistake. I'm thinking gender and sex were synonymous with each other. I understand that sometimes during fetal development chromosomes chemical imbalances can occur and people can be born intersex, but that IMO is an abnormality, although I'm aware probably some radically left person would beg to differ (no shade).
Personally I think reproductive organs decide the sex of the person regardless of how they behave, but I can understand other opinions on that matter.
Great post, though.
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Yeah, I believe most people believe sex is related to the reproductive organs, but do you mean functional or just what is innate? If functional, then you'd be disregarding those that just are infertile. If innate, you would be disregarding those that choose to change their sex later in life... in which case, I could understand your difference in view but if the surgery is done well, you may not even notice other than that it's not functional.
I can understand you on the technical sense though, seeing the number of people who experience such problems is an anomaly but I guess someone could find it offensive because this implies that people with such differences are not normal. Stuff like that could be related back to years ago when homosexuality was seen as abnormal, and heck, still is to some groups because being heterosexual is seen as the norm. Anyway, to each their own view 
Quote:
Originally posted by RedDlicious
Additionally there are transgendered people who are at varying stages of the transition, and think of themselves as outside of either gender. And even more, there are MANY transexuals who get top surgery (make body APPEAR to be the other gender) while keeping the lower genitalia of their original sex. These are people operating outside of gender norms, and that is why gender has become more complicated.
You are born a certain sex. You do not have to stay the assigned gender, and that is where this discussion takes place.
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Yep. I did not go into that in specific detail because then one can argue sex is what you are born with versus what genitalia/body you have at the end, so I just figured I'd include that together as genes/hormones/genitals determining sex, haha.
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Member Since: 1/13/2010
Posts: 5,334
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Quote:
Originally posted by RedDlicious
It amazes me that for a forum that I know has loads of peple in the LGBT community how ignorant people have been towards trans members and the ones who understand NOTHING about sex/gender. I don't expect people to be as into it as me, but I also expect people who have been discriminated against for something similar to not open their mouths before knowing what the **** they are talking about
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Go easy on him  I'm from a small town and I was 17 until I first heard of this stuff, at which point I was initially very confused. These views are usually expressed only by few people and in some places you'd be hard-pressed to find anybody talking about pansexuality and gender as a social construct, difference between sex and gender etc.
Great posts by orange 
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Member Since: 8/3/2010
Posts: 71,871
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So a pansexual is a bisexual? Mess 
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Banned
Member Since: 3/4/2011
Posts: 434
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We just loearned something today hell yeah!.................................. Ok on a serious note do you really tghink we bother abput this?
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Member Since: 11/11/2010
Posts: 1,720
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Quote:
Originally posted by RatedG
So a pansexual is a bisexual? Mess |
Did you read like one post or something, or is that really what you took from everything on this thread?
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Member Since: 7/10/2010
Posts: 9,489
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Quote:
Originally posted by RatedG
So a pansexual is a bisexual? Mess |
Boy, read the posts 
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Member Since: 3/26/2011
Posts: 22,809
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Quote:
Originally posted by Remeese
I'm attracted to girls, boys, transexuals, and animals.. could you ever? |
Animals you say?
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Member Since: 3/4/2011
Posts: 4,038
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I cannot believe the stupidity in this thread. Gender is a social construct. Why do you think men and women act differently in different cultures? Because gender. is. socially. constructed. We are all assigned a biological sex, but our genitalia isn't what determines the way we should or should not act, it's society's views on gender.
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Member Since: 11/11/2010
Posts: 28,420
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People really have sex with pans?
Kidding. 
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Member Since: 8/18/2010
Posts: 6,060
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Quote:
Originally posted by lolzjustinwat
I cannot believe the stupidity in this thread. Gender is a social construct. Why do you think men and women act differently in different cultures? Because gender. is. socially. constructed. We are all assigned a biological sex, but our genitalia isn't what determines the way we should or should not act, it's society's views on gender.
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however, it does determine most of our "features", manners & ways of thinking.
i know there are exceptions, but it just feels natural for a straight male to act a certain way & you cannot tell me you seriously think it's only cos it's been socially constructed.
the exceptions, however, tend to be more intelligent, smarter, think in a different way etc. & that makes up for the lack of an obvious gender.
nature took care of it all.
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ATRL Senior Member
Member Since: 12/29/2003
Posts: 6,311
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Quote:
Originally posted by bobiix
however, it does determine most of our "features", manners & ways of thinking.
i know there are exceptions, but it just feels natural for a straight male to act a certain way & you cannot tell me you seriously think it's only cos it's been socially constructed.
the exceptions, however, tend to be more intelligent, smarter, think in a different way etc. & that makes up for the lack of an obvious gender.
nature took care of it all.
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I realize this may be off-topic, so I would not mind if we continued this somewhere else, but what ways are you referring to? Also, why did you say straight male? Then it is not at all related to sex, but orientation as well, which defeats the gender discussion because gender relates to sex, not necessarily sex and sexual preferences.
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Member Since: 3/4/2011
Posts: 4,038
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Quote:
Originally posted by bobiix
however, it does determine most of our "features", manners & ways of thinking.
i know there are exceptions, but it just feels natural for a straight male to act a certain way & you cannot tell me you seriously think it's only cos it's been socially constructed.
the exceptions, however, tend to be more intelligent, smarter, think in a different way etc. & that makes up for the lack of an obvious gender.
nature took care of it all.
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Actually, I have taken gender classes, and there is very little to no evidence that shows men and women think or act differently because of the simple fact that they were born male or female. Society and the social construction of our gender is what has the biggest effect on how the different genders act and think.
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