There is obviously legitimacy to the notion of a third sex in the sense that, as you point out, intersex people exist and deserve our respect and consideration. I think there should be wiggle room with respect to such people when it comes to public policy. Taking the restroom policy issue we've been discussing, for instance, I'm good with having sex-neutral third options for the sake of intersex people who may not necessarily feel comfortable in either male or female restrooms. I think that's fine!

Being intersex is a biological reality for about 1% of the population. It's NOT an idea like being transgender.

Just as a broad aside, some people here have argued that women are in an equal amount of sexual danger from other women in public restrooms as they would be from men because lesbians exist. This argument is self-evidently nonsense. All one needs do is compare the prevalence of sexual violence in exclusively male spaces like male-only boarding schools, prisons, etc. to that in their exclusively female parallels to discover as much. Lesbianism finds more outlets and becomes more common in exclusively female environments, yet this doesn't produce either heightened or comparable levels of sexual violence compared to either co-ed or male-only parallel environments. Female-only environments are the safest kinds there are and that's a fact. That can begin to change, however, if and to the extent that men are allowed in.

I use the current interpretation that divorces gender from biological sex. Biological differences exist and should be respected, but they don't define you.

A woman is nothing more than a human that has certain biological characteristics and certain needs. Those needs are different from other humans, but they are in no way more or less important. The thing here is that humans are extremely diverse. There is no point in arbitrarily drawing a line between two groups if the biological differences within 1 group are as big as the differences between the groups. There are women that look and act like men and vice versa, so why even divide the groups then?

There are special needs people who have to regularly go to special physicians to get themselves checked for their own biological issues. Be it a woman going to a gynecologist or a wheelchair bound person going to the orthopedist. I don't think we'll have to assign a gender to differently abled people just because they're physically different, so why would we do that to biological sexes?

Genders are a social construct, created from the human need to categorize everything. From the earliest societies women were labeled the weaker gender, partly because of necessity and partly because male power fantasies. But that isn't really a natural state or a default state seeing how there have been matriarchal societies since the beginning of time. Biological sexes looked differently so of course they have to be separated. Animals and humans are wired to form groups and see members outside our group with skepticism. These things can be overcome however. Humans are intelligent enough to see past difference. We did it with races and we can do it with gender as well.

If we look at infants we can see universal acceptance and respect of all genders and races, which means they're only later indoctrinated. This indoctrination is not malicious in most cases but it's just very stupid and causes more problems than it's trying to fix. It all starts with gendered clothing, colors and even toys. One of the most egregious things are gendered bathrooms. Children are taught to keep to their own gender. Having homogeneous gendered groups in childhood and especially youth creates a very toxic circlejerk within these groups who will then define the other group and creating a false picture, further dividing them. At the end of adolescence all the damage is done.

To change people's perception of gender we need to start in the early childhood. The current generation is already lost but change can come in the future. At some point people have to stop caring about genders. Sadly we're currently going in the opposite direction. Ironically it's fueled by people who fight for gender equality. We're currently regressing in our acceptance of genders and races because people put emphasis on things that should not be emphasized.

I think I made my point here. Now I'm trying to think of a way to fix the issue with gendered changing rooms.

I think that this notion that people can be whatever they want and whatever they feel like at any given day is dangerous notion.

For us humans to be able to coexist as a society we need to have boundaries, rules and yes, definitions and labels. And yes, I know this seem to contradict the notion of "freedom" but to live as a society we can never be entirely "free", for example: We are not free to go around killing whatever we want, we are not free to go around slapping people on the streets, we are not free to enter whatever house (or location) we want, we are not free to go around ignoring the traffic lights, etc etc etc

What I'm getting at here is that there are physical and legal consequences linked to the notions of "male" and "female" person. And many of the laws currently in place stem from the fact that male and female bodies are built differently. Just some examples: 1) A man and a woman get into a fight and usually the male is the one who goes to jail. But if said man starts saying that he is really a woman then things change. 2) A man commits a crime and is gonna be sent to a male-prison, but if all of a sudden he says that he is really a woman then the jury is gonna have to consider sending him to a female-prison. 3) When a couple get divorced usually the man is forced to pay alimony to the woman but again, things are gonna change if all of a sudden the guy says that he is really a woman.

Then we have sports. Who can compete with who? you cannot have a biological male person boxing, wrestling, running, weight lifting, etc with a biological female.

And these are just a few examples of the top of my head. I'm sure there will be MANY instances where some ill-intentioned people are going to find ways to bend the laws to get away with things.

So, to wrap things up, I have no problem with people calling themselves whatever they want to call themselves and using whatever pronouns they want to use on themselves as long as it doesnt affect me. But when your freedom start conflicting with my own freedom, then we need to sit down and define our boundaries. And no, I don't think people going around saying: Ok, yesterday I was "X", today I feel "Y" and tomorrow I may or may not feel "A" is ever going to work legally speaking.

So yes, as much as I hate governments intervening in our lives, I think they are going to have to sit down and properly define what we really are biologically, physically, psychologically and legally speaking.

"Being transgender is completely different from being from a different species, c'mon."

i thought gender was a social construct unrelated to biology?

how can you at one point say that gender is a social construct then when the absurdity of this claim is pointed out fall back on biology?

if there is nothing rooted in material reality that determines gender then why can't someone choose to identify as a unicorn?

you see this is why i have to ask questions because clearly you either do not believe in what you are saying or you are deeply confused

No one is saying that you can identify as non-human."

again a biological argument from someone who says biology shouldn't determine gender otherwise

"That's what they do when they don't have arguments, they answer with random questions to try and change the subject."

i ask questions in the hope that i can reach some type of clarity on how so many people can hold contradictory beliefs in their head so easily and willfully

" This should never, ever, ever, need to be pointed out to you again."

dishonestly evading straight answers on this topic doesn't make it logically consistent even though you may think so

"Gender is a function under a specific, given set (Human)."

now what I would say is that its simply a function of sex/biology but you have decided to throw that away, so what is gender derived from in your view?

I have so far heard that its simply clothing, is that your belief? that if I wanted to become a man then all i'd need to do is change up the clothing I wear?

why could I then not decide to invent some new clothing styles to represent a new gender I have created?

why couldn't I paste a horn to my head and call myself a unicorn?

"No one has said that gender is derived from clothing. "

*looks a couple pages back*

"

Most transgender persons I've seen or met dress very cliche masculin or cliche feminine, so yes this rule of thumb will probably cover 90%."

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=9017717

i could look through other thread i've participated in and bring up even more if you want

"If you go by chromosomes: you run into 2 difficulties..."

exceptions exist with any practical category, the same will occur with whatever redefinition of gender you believe in

"However you biologically define gender, you at minimum need to accept that scientifically there are at least 3 genders."

men, women and what else? how would you define this third gender?

"That's a fact you keep ignoring or dismissing."

because its not a fact, having a very small penis, or a very large clit or being a hermaphrodite does not make someone a third gender

but lets say that i'm wrong, how would you define this third gender?

"You keep trying to bring up the species argument,"

i never at any point talked about species? 

"but how do you think society would care?  Suppose that someone out there really wanted to be a unicorn, what does it matter?  How do you think that would affect society?"

i have no problem with people pretending to be what they want to be, i've always said that, my problem is when other people are expected or forced to abide by their delusions

the same way that i don't think christians should be able to impose their religious doctrine on people despite me also thinking that they should be free to practice them

regardless of that what's wrong with someone such as myself raising these issues to seek clarification? i never expected to see someone the justifications i've seen in these discussions and i've learned a lot, that wouldn't have happened if i'd just kept my mouth shut

"people have to respect what other people are called (holy cow, just like it is right now!")

if you are referring to pronouns, people assess which pronouns apply to people they interact with on a subconscious level... because we identify who is male and female (through obvious biological characteristics) on a subconscious level 

the proposal here is that despite all of this a person should just fight themselves internally to submit to this ideology and i would think that in a free society we wouldn't be going down this route

"people have to respect what gender someone wants to be (I know, it's totally different from what we have right now where we only respect what gender someone is.)"

why should they have to? in the process lying to themselves internally?

"If someone wanted to be called a unicorn and yet they still act like a regular person.  I don't consider that an issue. It doesn't change anything."

i wouldn't care as i've said, again i asked seeking clarification because again obviously if physical characteristics don't matter and its about what is in the mind then why couldn't someone identify as a unicorn?

"If someone wanted to be called a unicorn and act like they are a unicorn, that's only an issue because that person is going to have a lot of issues with life.  As long as they are being respectful of other people, I really don't care."

same here as long as i don't have to entertain their bullshit and i don't have more laws and restrictions placed on my freedom then have at it

"You seem to be mistaking gender identity with gender expression."

for this context they are one and the same, because obviously the people around you can't perceive what is going on inside your head unless you express it right? or do you live on a remote island populated by psychics?

"Your unicorn example doesn't work because how does one feel like a unicorn?"

the same way this woman can feel like a cat in a woman's body?

https://www.thenewamerican.com/culture/item/22435-woman-says-she-s-a-cat-trapped-in-human-body-gender-identity-unknown

so you think she's crazy?

how does one feel like a female when they are in a male's body?

"To go back to my math analogy"

doesn't apply because you don't believe that biology has a place in discussion about gender, unless i'm wrong?

"Just recognize you are intentionally making a mockery out of people's legitimate psychological feelings and emotions"

i'm not, its a clarifying question because as i've said if biology is not where the differentiation is being made and instead we rely on what people identify as then this presents what i would think should be obvious problems

beyond that this is not an argument feelings do not determine reality, so why would someone's feelings matter in a discussion about reality? do you cut religious people this kind of slack?

Gender is one of a few things, depending on which definition you want to use.

Yes, there are multiple definitions. Yes, one of them refers to social norms and conventions. But yes, one of them also explicitly refers to sexes. Literally everyone in this thread is correct except for the fact that they can't agree on which definition we're talking about.

What I find amusing about the "gender" debate is that it's basically an English language problem.
In Romania, we don't talk about genders when talking about a person. Genders are noun related, for inanimate objects, and that's about it. A person has a "sex" and that's all. There is nothing aside from biology that factors into the discussion about what a person is in that regards.
Which leads to the very interesting question of how much the language influences this sort of thing for a person. Is it indeed an issue or is it just something that got cooked up in a very strange rebellion against social norms and/or political correctness.