*Part 2 of 2 - read part 1: ‘Countering Harmful Narratives’ here
** for more informed/stimulating/referenced discussion read:
Kathleen Stock / Jane Clare Jones / Maya Forstater
The systemic conflation of the words sex (i.e. definition: male or female) and gender (stereotypical characteristics of males or female) has undermined practice, policy & discussion of issues affecting women's rights and sex-based protections.
Gender stereotypes have long been the justification for sexist law and sexist cultural norms. Women's equality began fighting these stereotypes which underpinned the idea that women were intellectually lesser than men, naturally subordinates to men, inherently the property of men. These culturally perpetuated stereotypes and the consequent impact in legal, medical and social life persist but without clear vocabulary are obscured beyond the scope measured dialogue and debate.
Policy and Law
The readiness of authorities, organisations and companies to expand definitions of mutually exclusive categories (male or female / man or woman) to each become inclusive of their binary renders these most common and necessary terms incomprehensible. Further, use of the words woman or man which does not recognise 'self-identified women/men' as included in these categories is now deemed 'hate speech' which can and already has resulted in professional, financial and legal sanctions.
Where governments, authorities and organisations approve, support, promote or endorse interchangeable, optional or self-identified uses of the words sex and gender the meaning of each word must first (though, now, retrospectively by necessity) be clearly and rigorously defined. These clear and rigorous definitions must involve robust analysis of historic and continued gender stereotypes and the impacts of these gender stereotypes in terms of health, prospects and autonomy.
Definitions & Meaning
There has been a relentless campaign and, simultaneously, an inadvertent slide to replace/supersede sex (i.e. definition: male or female) with gender (stereotypical characteristics of males or females) in official policy and practice resulting in the words being used interchangeably.
Regardless of intention, this conflation of the terms sex and gender prevents any clear, robust discussion and understanding of any issue where the distinction is not only important but essential.
If the meaning of male/female is defined by gender stereotypes it ceases to define biological sex. If the meaning of male/female is defined by biological sex it cannot be determined by gender stereotypes.
Crucially:
If is accepted that the words woman and man define people with (often robustly contested and debunked, historically changeable and rooted in misogyny) stereotyped social performance of males or females (i.e. gender: masculinity/femininity) then, by definition, all those who do not conform to or perform these stereotypes no longer belong to their categories male or female.
If female/woman is no longer to be defined by primary and secondary sex characteristics but instead as a feeling (i.e. a person 'feels like a woman') there must be rigorous analysis of what that feeling is, what informs that feeling and whether it could be said to be common to all women as primary and secondary sex characteristics are.
If male/man is no longer to be defined by primary and secondary sex characteristics but instead as a feeling (i.e. a person 'feels like a man') there must be rigorous analysis of what that feeling is, what informs that feeling and whether it could be said to be common to all men as primary and secondary sex characteristics are.
The current criteria (ALL CONTESTED) for 'feeling like a woman/man' include:
clothing preference
active interests
sexual preference
intellectual interests
emotional profile
behavioural profile
'INNATE INTERNAL FEELING'
Treatment Models & Medicalisation
The affirmation model, for people whose bodies represent to them a deep psycho-social dysphoria, reinforces this fiction, deepening rather than treating the causes of dysphoria. This medicalisation of individuals - with affirmations, medications and surgery - does not treat but instead exacerbates dysphoria, leading dysphoric people to further internalise gender non-conformity as 'being in the wrong body'.
Rights & Protections
Discrimination based on a person's gender expression is and should continue to be unlawful. There is no need to falsely assert a person's sex has changed in order to protect their freedom of (gender) expression.
Human sex does not change – this, where it is asserted, is always a legal fiction and the consequences and ramifications of this fiction are far more serious and pervasive than lawmakers intended. A shift of emphasis is needed away from this fiction, away from denial of (biological) sex and towards freedom of (gender) expression for any person of either sex with continuing legal protections for any person discriminated against on the basis of sex.
Where existing sex based protections have been eroded, breached, removed or replaced in line with what is called 'gender identity policy' these protections should be reasserted and reinforced. Existing protections based on a person's sex:
must remain lawful
must be recommended practice
In the Name of Progress
The increasingly common substitution and conflation of the word sex with the word gender has contributed to the continued disadvantage of women and introduced new infringements on women's hard fought sex based protections.
No law should support, facilitate or enshrine demonstrably false beliefs. No law should criminalise open dissent of / non-compliance with demonstrably false beliefs.
Progress is the act of reforming laws, systems and structures which, by design or application, normalise, perpetuate or reinforce demonstrably false and/or discriminatory beliefs.
There is nothing progressive about gender stereotypes.