Are_Euclidding_Me [e/em/eir]

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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: May 1st, 2023

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  • So you’re saying gametes determine sex and anyone who doesn’t produce gametes has no sex. Cool. That’s fine, and a reasonable way to define “sex”, if we must do so.

    Your definition of sex isn’t a common one, most people who care to try and define sex don’t like saying that people can have no sex at all, which is what you’re saying.

    I clearly said in my comment that every human produces at most one of two possible types of gamete, so I don’t know why you spent so many sentences talking about a hypothetical third gamete, I’m well aware there’s no such thing.

    I’m also going to emphasize, once again, that genitals don’t always match gametes and, furthermore, don’t always fit cleanly into either penis or vulva, lots of people are born with ambiguous genitalia.




  • the stuff we all have between legs, that definitely defines sex.

    Ok, but like, it doesn’t. See this comment I made yesterday.

    Edit: I’m actually going to copy the comment here, so no one has to click on a link to read it:

    What do we mean by “sex”?

    Do we mean chromosomes? If so, there aren’t two sexes, there are a whole bunch, look at the list on this Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_chromosome_anomalies

    Do we mean genitals? If so, again, there aren’t two distinct sexes, instead it’s more of a spectrum between “this is obviously a penis” and “this is obviously a vulva”. In fact, infants with genitals that can’t be neatly classified as a penis or a vulva frequently have surgery forced upon them and these (completely unnecessary) surgeries cause all sorts of issues later in life.

    Do we mean hormonal profile? Again, it’s not as straightforward as testosterone = male, estrogen = female. The endocrine system is wildly complicated and the ratios of sex hormones people have can vary wildly. A person’s hormonal profile is also extremely changeable, which is something shitty right-wingers don’t want “biological sex” to be.

    Do we mean size of gametes? This is the only option that even remotely makes sense, because it is true that in humans there are only two kinds of gametes, small gametes (sperm) and large gametes (eggs). Furthermore, there has never been a case of a human who produces both eggs and sperm, every human produces at most one of the two. But lots of people are completely infertile, producing no gametes. So if by “sex” we mean the size of gametes someone produces, then there are a whole lot of people who are sexless because they produce no gametes.

    But ok, size of gamete produced almost works as a definition of “sex”. So maybe we could look at the gonads in people who don’t produce gametes and make a determination of their sex that way. Well, it turns out that doesn’t work either, because there are people with both ovarian tissue and testicular tissue, and sometimes these tissues are even mixed together in the same organ (called “streak gonads”).

    So what are we left with? Nothing. There’s nothing to “sex”, it’s a meaningless term. Listen to any shitty right-winger try and define “biological sex” and you’ll hear them eventually say something like “a male is someone whose reproductive system is geared towards producing sperm”. But what does that mean? Fuck all, I’d say. What shitty right-wingers mean is “a female is someone who I think is a woman”. They’re all of them, to a person, talking about gender every time they say “biological sex”. They’ll deny it, but ask them about intersex people, or people with ambiguous genitalia or streak gonads, and you’ll get nonsense in response.

    I’ve whiled away many a hilarious hour reading terfs (on ovarit, before it shutdown) arguing about which particular intersex people count as women. They never agree, there is no “party line”, it’s all vibes and always has been.




  • Mate, I just posted a meme in our own comm

    Are you fucking serious? Remind me again what the first comment posted in this thread was? Was it you saying:

    I expect some spicy takes in the comments soon…

    Yes, yes it was, you disengenuous fuck. I’m beginning to agree with the people saying you have a humiliation fetish, I don’t know why else you’d decide to make this post.





  • I don’t like calling it a spectrum for the simple reason that it’s not clear to me that there’s always a sensible way to say someone is “more female” or “more male” than someone else.

    Like, if someone is born with a penis and ovaries, are they closer to the “male” side of the spectrum or the “female” side? How do they compare to someone born with a vulva and testicles? Which of these people is more male? Which more female? Do we give primacy to what we can see outside the body (the genitals) or to the gonads, which we can’t see, but are much more important to gamete production than genitals?

    I know these hypotheticals are rare, it’s extremely, extremely rare to be born with a penis and ovaries, or a vulva and testicles. But it is possible, and I just don’t see how we can reasonably say which is “more male” or “more female”.


  • I might be the only person on this whole website who liked Deadpool. Of course, I only saw it the once, when it was in theaters, so who knows how I’d feel about it now, I very well might hate it. I sure hate what it did to movies! I hate that its particular brand of “hilarious” 4th-wall breaking is everywhere now, that shit wears so fucking thin so fast. I watched Deadpool x Wolverine (or whatever the fuck it was called) and that movie made me want to gouge my eyeballs out.

    You know? I think I’ve talked myself into hating the original Deadpool, retroactively.


  • I mean something a little deeper than that. I literally mean that “sex” doesn’t exist as such. I know this is a strong claim, maybe unbelievable if you’ve never heard it before, but give me a second to explain.

    What do we mean by “sex”?

    Do we mean chromosomes? If so, there aren’t two sexes, there are a whole bunch, look at the list on this Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_chromosome_anomalies

    Do we mean genitals? If so, again, there aren’t two distinct sexes, instead it’s more of a spectrum between “this is obviously a penis” and “this is obviously a vulva”. In fact, infants with genitals that can’t be neatly classified as a penis or a vulva frequently have surgery forced upon them and these (completely unnecessary) surgeries cause all sorts of issues later in life.

    Do we mean hormonal profile? Again, it’s not as straightforward as testosterone = male, estrogen = female. The endocrine system is wildly complicated and the ratios of sex hormones people have can vary wildly. A person’s hormonal profile is also extremely changeable, which is something shitty right-wingers don’t want “biological sex” to be.

    Do we mean size of gametes? This is the only option that even remotely makes sense, because it is true that in humans there are only two kinds of gametes, small gametes (sperm) and large gametes (eggs). Furthermore, there has never been a case of a human who produces both eggs and sperm, every human produces at most one of the two. But lots of people are completely infertile, producing no gametes. So if by “sex” we mean the size of gametes someone produces, then there are a whole lot of people who are sexless because they produce no gametes.

    But ok, size of gamete produced almost works as a definition of “sex”. So maybe we could look at the gonads in people who don’t produce gametes and make a determination of their sex that way. Well, it turns out that doesn’t work either, because there are people with both ovarian tissue and testicular tissue, and sometimes these tissues are even mixed together in the same organ (called “streak gonads”).

    So what are we left with? Nothing. There’s nothing to “sex”, it’s a meaningless term. Listen to any shitty right-winger try and define “biological sex” and you’ll hear them eventually say something like “a male is someone whose reproductive system is geared towards producing sperm”. But what does that mean? Fuck all, I’d say. What shitty right-wingers mean is “a female is someone who I think is a woman”. They’re all of them, to a person, talking about gender every time they say “biological sex”. They’ll deny it, but ask them about intersex people, or people with ambiguous genitalia or streak gonads, and you’ll get nonsense in response.

    I’ve whiled away many a hilarious hour reading terfs (on ovarit, before it shutdown) arguing about which particular intersex people count as women. They never agree, there is no “party line”, it’s all vibes and always has been.

    Does this make sense? Is this helpful?



  • Hey, this is a super tiny point that in no way should take away from the rest of your post, but lots of people people absolutely can change whether they menstruate. I did, for instance, by getting my uterus removed.

    It’s taking everything I have right now not to write a super long comment about how “biological sex” isn’t even a real fucking thing and gender is and always has been primary. Transphobes are wrong about everything, but trying to argue with them by saying “sex and gender are clearly different and should not be conflated” seems, to me, a losing battle. We have better (truer, more compelling) arguments at our disposal.