J.K. Rowling Writes about Her Reasons for Speaking out on Sex and Gender Issues

[sundin13]

KLAMarine said:

sundin13 said:

You asked why I used quotations around "biological" and I explained it. You seem to have no qualms with the content of that explanation. I am not suggesting we "bust out the blood tests" to assess someone's sex, so I'm not sure where that came from. I am just saying that we should acknowledge that biology goes beyond phenotype. That seems utterly and completely uncontroversial to me. What exactly are you taking umbrage with?

And is "assessing someone's sex" something that you do often? Seems weird...

Apologies. I was afraid you were going to tell me biology is make-believe. So far, nothing terribly controversial...

As for assessing sex, yes. Every day. I see someone who looks like a man or a woman, I assess their sex superficially. Of course there's chance I am wrong about my assessment but that's okay: I'm not putting money down on people's sex.

Quite the opposite. Biology is very much real, and as a Biologist, I should hope so. It is those who assert biology ends at the genitals who are doing a disservice to Biology and that is what I was calling out.

And I find your statement about assessing sex interesting. If genitals at birth are the convenient way to determine sex, why don't you use this information when making these assessments? And if you are making assessments about sex in the absence of this information, is it truly sex that you are making an assessment about, or is it gender expression?