Another Short Intermission

The following post is the result of some more pent-up frustration regarding gender and how it's discussed in a class of mine.   

What really bothers me is when people use sex and gender interchangeably. I get why they do that, *insert long winded explanation about society, socialization, binaries, culture, etc,* but I can’t help that it still gets under my skin. ^[1] I think the reason that I can’t compartmentalize this issue very well is because I continually butt up against the fact that under that paradigm/ideology/way of thinking about the world, I cannot exist. 

               Using sex and gender interchangeably means that the following statement—which, mind you, is a gross generalization—“all women love Valentine’s Day, but men could care less” and the statement “all females love Valentine’s Day, but males could care less” have the exact same meaning. The underpinning idea here is that your body both determines and causes your gender identity. In Gender studies scholars acknowledge that this isn’t true, *insert another long winded explanation about correlation not causation, the changing ideas of both sex/gender through history, and confirmation bias,* but they also acknowledge that this is a widely held belief and categorize it as biological essentialism. In this view, the idea of transgender folk makes sense so long as you can say that the transgender person was simply “born in the wrong body.” However, that explanation can only work if the trans person is a trans woman or a trans man, and even then, it’s not always an accurate depiction of their experiences.

              Fair warning, this is where my writing becomes a bit more vent-esque and personal. People who are more aware of gender related issues and ideas generally say that they are “amab” or “afab” which means “assigned male at birth” and “assigned female at birth” respectively. The acronyms are representative of the fact that even though there are differences between bodies those differences have been labeled and categorized as male and female by society. Meaning that male and female are merely the words we use to describe an amalgamation of physical markers. This is all an oversimplification, but I’m saying it because by that conception of sex, I am a female. I was afab and I continue to have all the physical characteristics that would put me in the female category. Nevertheless, I am not a woman; the fact that I am female and the fact that I am not a woman can exist simultaneously only when sex and gender are recognized as different things. In biological essentialism, those two facts are impossible thereby disallowing me from existing.

This is also why it bothers me when people say that they identify as female or male. No, you don’t, you identify as a woman or a man, the categories of female and male are predetermined and defined by literally everyone but yourself. It’s just so infuriating, and, well, I suppose hurtful is an apt descriptor. I also can’t help but think that people of color must feel something similar whenever media, e.g. literature, movies, T.V., etc, refuses to give them representation—if you can’t see someone, can you ever really acknowledge that they exist?  

Wow, it took a lot of energy to write this in a coherent manner. I’m pretty sure that’s mostly because I have to make sure I’m explaining what I mean every step of the way because I can’t assume that any potential reader has the same background knowledge as me. I skipped some of the explanations as you can tell lol, but still. 

 ^[1] If anyone wants me to actually explain this, please ask me in the comments and I will at a later date. I'm just too tired right now, and besides, the purpose of this post is not educational.