[veidr]

I dunno man, I think you are getting tripped up on the evolution of the English language. Yes, your kids are either male or female (mine are all male). Those fundamental physical characteristics can't be changed by language.

But what language means does change. The term "gender" used to mean basically the same thing as "sex", but now it's evolved to mean "the other stuff, aside from biological sex". How they act (for dogs), or that and also how they want to be perceived (for humans, but maybe also dogs; I've known quite many dogs over the years, and that includes a couple of bad-ass bitches that wanted you and the other dogs in the room to know who was boss).

Language evolution is often uncomfortable.

I don't like that "crypto" means the grifter funny money shit now, instead of cryptography like science intended... but it does. My objection doesn't change that; it's a consensus thing. It might be the same for you.

Do they have to bring it up? I mean, kinda debatable, maybe. I did ask about sex, not gender. Strictly speaking, no they didn't have to bring it up. But in that same vein they could have just answered, "Male or female." That would have seemed somehow insufficient. Adding context is pretty core to what these fuzzy-logic language-model generated-text vendors are offering.

But anyway, it's not really debatable that dogs "express gender identity". Because that now means "how they act and how they express themselves". It indeed "doesn't exist" as some kind of empirical boolean value (unlike sex (ignoring for simplicity the highly unusual biological intersex cases I just learned about, haha)).

Because, in the now-prevailing meaning of the term, it is literally an interpretation of their behavior.

It doesn't negate or contradict biological sex, it just now means something separate.

[feanaro]

> I don't like that "crypto" means the grifter funny money shit now, instead of cryptography like science intended... but it does. My objection doesn't change that; it's a consensus thing. It might be the same for you.

As an aside about language, I don't think this is the right way to think about word meaning.

Before, it meant nothing to most people and "cryptography" to computer scientists and cryptographers. Now it means "cryptocurrency" to most people and it still means "cryptography" to computer scientist and cryptographers.

Just like you wouldn't have said "crypto" means nothing in the times before, it is incorrect to say it now means "cryptocurrency". Alternate meanings can and do coexist. The tyranny of the majority does not a language make.

And this is the crux of the issue, I think. There is no single language at any time -- this is only an often useful simplification.

[fennecfoxy]

You're right, but as someone in the queer community (gay) the gradual evolution of human behaviours between the sexes (and genders) including gender roles etc (being broken down for some, but not for others) will possibly eventually result in a collapse of all meaning within this system.

There's many points to someone's biological sex, medical and other. But when it comes to gender, once stereotypical gender roles have completely broken down (if ever, we have evolution/genetic to thank for that) what difference remains in that distinguishing your own gender even matters anymore? None.

[Vt71fcAqt7]

>you are getting tripped up on the evolution of the English language

I think you are getting tripped up here. GP said "there is no such thing as gender identity." You bringing up the (forced, and incomplete) change of definition of gender from what it generaly meant in public use is not relevant at all. In any case, not all words are grounded in reality. If gender now means something that doesn't realy exists then it is a useless word. And failure to understand the semantics involved in the gender identity debate is present in almost every argument, which was in no doubt caused by the forced attempt to redefine "man" and "woman" in terms of "gender idenity." (As well as the redefinition of "gender" to an extent but "gender" as a term for sex is recent in any event and has been used by acedemics to refer to the sex based behavioral differences between males and females since its begining.)

>it's not really debatable that dogs "express gender identity"

They need to have a gender identity in order to express it. That is, a gender identy such that it is possible for it to be a seperate thing from sex, and as a direct feeling of being that gender. There is no evidence that a male dog feels like a "man" (or whatever we would call this gender for a dog). Insofar as "expressing gender identity" only descibes the way a male dogs like to bark, or what have you, which I think is what you mean, you would be correct, but that would be misunderstanding what "gender identity" is, however, since there is no single behavior or set of behaviors that affect one's gender (like, for example, a "male bark") but rather a direct feeling of being a certain gender. For example, there are many males who identify as women that still do many man things, such as extensive video gaming or programming or being aggresive. My point with this is that you cannot say that "expressing gender identity" is simply that the dog behaves like a male dog, rather it must identify as a man, which there is no proof of. So you cannot say that "it's not really debatable that dogs 'express gender identity.'"

[veidr]

Sorry, but you're just repeating the same misunderstanding as the post I was replying to. The terms "gender" and "gender identity" simply don't mean what you think they mean.

You want them to, I get it. But it's not up to us as individuals. Language is a group thing. You might not be ready to concede the change, but I can't help but think that's based on some irrational attachment you have to the old meanings, for whatever reason.

Regardless, time and language march on. It doesn't really matter if you (or I) like it, or think that the words are therefor "useless" or "don't really exist", etc.

[Vt71fcAqt7]

I dont care what gender means:

>If gender now means something that doesn't realy exist then it is a useless word.

>As well as the redefinition of "gender" to an extent but "gender" as a term for sex is recent in any event and has been used by acedemics to refer to the sex based behavioral differences between males and females since its begining.

I notice you didn't respond to the rest of the post which is understandable given that you didn't even understand the part that you did reply to.

>but I can't help but think that's based on some irrational attachment you have to the old meanings

Can you point to where I show any attachment to the word "gender?" As I said, "gender" is a recent term for sex in any case, and I don't care about losing "gender" as a word in itself. What I did say is that people are unable to have meaningful conversations because of the confusion caused by the the attempt to redefine these words. I also disagree that the words have truly been redefined, not out of emotional attachment but because I simply do not agree with your claim that the definition has reached a consensus. And to your point about language being "a group thing," I would add that it was the genderists who forced this redefinition, complete with rules to fire people who do not follow it. That doesn't sound like "a group thing" to me at all. An example of a real redefinition is the word "egregious" which originally meant "outstanding."[0] Nobody forced anyone for the meaning to change, it evolved naturaly. In any case, my argument does not even rely on what the definition of "gender" realy is.

>or think that the words are therefor "useless" or "don't really exist", etc.

You have it completly backwords here. The word is useless as it conveys something that does not exist. Therefore we should not use it, but if we did truly use this word I would not say that it doesn't mean that, only that the meaning itself has no meaning. I think your inability to understand that words and meaning are seperate is what is confusing you here. But from the absense of "man" and "woman" from your argument alongside "gender," I think even you know that we will never see a male as a woman.

[0]https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/egregious-word...

[skyyler]

>man things, such as extensive video gaming or programming

Adorable how you people reveal your biases at the smallest provocation...

My mom really enjoys the Silent Hill series and my wife loves Zelda. Can you explain what makes "extensive video gaming" a man thing?

For that matter, what makes programming a man thing? Some of the most prominent names in computer science are women. Grace Murray Hopper would probably take some issue to you calling programming a man thing.

[Vt71fcAqt7]

I wasn't refering to casual games. I've played thousands of hours of cs and almost all the girls I've seen were with thier boyfriends and were always bottom frag with few hours on their account. The competitve nature of cs makes it a male dominated game. I see women playing candy crush/ animal crossing all the time but these games are not competitive.

>what makes programming a man thing?

Characteristic Share of respondents

Man 91.88%

Woman 5.17%

Non-binary, genderqueer, or gender non-conforming 1.67%

Prefer not to say 1.65%

Or, in your own words 0.74% [0]

There are almost as many trans male programmers as female programmers. It is also linked with autism which is mostly a male condition. (Which is true for video games as well.)

[0]https://www.statista.com/statistics/1126823/worldwide-develo...

[skyyler]

I wasn't referring to casual games either.

I'm sure my friend Melanie has more hours in the disgaea series than you do in your little shooter games.

My wife's sister makes a pretty penny buying and selling items in some MMO. She doesn't interact with the community on voice chat though, for reasons you make very clear in this interaction.

Your conceptions of gendered behaviour are built upon your personal definitions of gender. It's silly to assume otherwise.

[Vt71fcAqt7]

>my friend Melanie

>My wife's sister

n=2.

>A total of 395 junior high school students were recruited for evaluation of their experiences playing online games.

>[...]

>This study found that subjects who had previously played online games were predominantly male. Gender differences were also found in the severity of online gaming addiction and motives for playing.[0]

From another study:

>A total of 25,573 students (49.8 % boys and 50.2 % girls) across junior and senior high schools participated in the study.

[...]

>Table 2 lists students’ most frequent online activities. The percentage of frequent online gamers was higher for boys than girls at both school levels, z=13.63, p<0.001 for junior high; z=13.72, p<0.001 for senior high.[1]

[0]https://journals.lww.com/jonmd/Abstract/2005/04000/Gender_Di...

[1]https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25079945/