Reversed and Remanded

[dachte]

One of the ways you can tell you're arguing poorly about an issue is when people who have little opinion on the issue read your argument and hope things go against you just for spite. I confess to the latter with a recent post on Google+ by "Siderea B", a post which has been floating through my social circles. There are quite a lot of these posts

Comments

[dachte]

But you don't get to tell other people what they can infer. That's their definitional framework. Actually, I don't know what you mean by "other", but I don't really mind that much. Whenever I read other, I either think:
1) This person is paranoid to a silly degree
2) This person has a complex notion of gender/sex and even though my framework does not need to deal with that complication (being explicitly designed for clean answers), my notion of their identity and their notion of their identity might not line up well so BE CAREFUL DISCUSSING THOSE ISSUES
3) This person is making a point of some kind
4) There's some other reason this person clicked other specific to this site

People think about gender and sex in a myriad of ways, and however *you* self-identify in these areas, there's no guarantee that they make *any* sense in another. From people who say sex=gender=M/F to people who say that either can be self-defined and they're both very different characteristics with infinite possibible values, you can't really project your notion of identity sensibly onto all of them.

[bubblingbeebles]

i'm not worried about people not inferring the right definition; i'm worried about people inferring a wrong definition. (in fact, i prefer exactly for people to make no inferences at all, which is why i want to hide the option entirely.) the way you interpret "other" is completely agreeable, but i don't have faith that everybody will be as thoughtful.

[dachte]

I think people will always start out assuming some things, either from your picture or your decision not to say something or whatever. I think it's the same with if you meet someone in person, they'll look at your clothes, posture, diction, scent, etc, and come to some understanding. You can try to shape your identity with them if/after you meet them, but even that's not a sure thing. I don't think "this doesn't give me the tools I want to shape my presentation to others" is really much of a complaint given how varied these goals are.

[bubblingbeebles]

ok; i mean, i never expect this particular setting to have a big impact on perception, but it would still be a small comfort i would enjoy taking. (and, i'm sure there are those less genderly-secure than i am who need all the comfort they can get.)

of course it is not a cure-all for shaping my presentation to others. the rest of the toolbox for that is a work in progress, but all the same, i'd like to have this tool among my inventory, and i see no reason i shouldn't be given it.