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<blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 7441748" data-attributes="member: 177">Well, only math has really exact definitions.&nbsp; Biology and sociology are more squidgey.&nbsp; But, let us take this for a moment.&nbsp; You said, &quot;female&quot; and &quot;male&quot;.&nbsp; Not Woman and Man.&nbsp; When someone says, &quot;Quit your whining and be a man!&quot; they are most decidedly NOT suggesting you step out and fertilize some ova.&nbsp; They are talking about your meeting some expectations of behavior - that is mostly a social construct, not a biological issue.&nbsp; We could argue for very long periods of time about whether those expectations ever made any sense.&nbsp; But the fact of the matter is that the majority of them ceased to be all that relevant after the Industrial Revolution - the time after which males in our culture stopped needing to personally face down things with yard-long horns in order to put a steak on the dinner table.That is an excellent question.&nbsp; For this discussion, we don't actually need to know the full answer.&nbsp; What we need to know is that &quot;man&quot; does not need to equal &quot;genetically male*&quot;, and &quot;woman&quot; does not equal &quot;genetically female&quot;.&nbsp;&nbsp; A typical way of dealing with this is to say that man and woman denote gender - those are expectations that are socially influenced.&nbsp; Male and female denote sex.No.&nbsp; A person SHOULD be able to call themselves whatever they want, live how they want, and all that.&nbsp; If the reality matched that, I daresay this whole discussion would be unnecessary.Oh?&nbsp; Really?You can remember that your friend who is named James prefers to be called Jim.&nbsp; You can hold the fact that Rebecca is okay with Becky, but will slap you if you call her &quot;Bek&quot;.&nbsp; You can remember honorifics and such - Dr. Prof. Miss Mrs. Ms. Mr. Jr. and the III.&nbsp; You can even switch forms of address as dictated by social situation - at work it may be Dr. Smith, but at home it is Mrs. Walters.&nbsp; But keeping the pronoun straight is too much for you?&nbsp; Your brain stores specific information about every named individual in your world already.&nbsp; Are you sure the issue is that you can't?&nbsp; Or is it that you can't be bothered? *Note this squidgeyness of biology - I had to specify &quot;genetically&quot; male, because there are cases where that morphology you mention does not match the genes, either by early accident, or by later medical design.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Umbran, post: 7441748, member: 177"] Well, only math has really exact definitions. Biology and sociology are more squidgey. But, let us take this for a moment. You said, "female" and "male". Not Woman and Man. When someone says, "Quit your whining and be a man!" they are most decidedly NOT suggesting you step out and fertilize some ova. They are talking about your meeting some expectations of behavior - that is mostly a social construct, not a biological issue. We could argue for very long periods of time about whether those expectations ever made any sense. But the fact of the matter is that the majority of them ceased to be all that relevant after the Industrial Revolution - the time after which males in our culture stopped needing to personally face down things with yard-long horns in order to put a steak on the dinner table. That is an excellent question. For this discussion, we don't actually need to know the full answer. What we need to know is that "man" does not need to equal "genetically male*", and "woman" does not equal "genetically female". A typical way of dealing with this is to say that man and woman denote gender - those are expectations that are socially influenced. Male and female denote sex. No. A person SHOULD be able to call themselves whatever they want, live how they want, and all that. If the reality matched that, I daresay this whole discussion would be unnecessary. Oh? Really? You can remember that your friend who is named James prefers to be called Jim. You can hold the fact that Rebecca is okay with Becky, but will slap you if you call her "Bek". You can remember honorifics and such - Dr. Prof. Miss Mrs. Ms. Mr. Jr. and the III. You can even switch forms of address as dictated by social situation - at work it may be Dr. Smith, but at home it is Mrs. Walters. But keeping the pronoun straight is too much for you? Your brain stores specific information about every named individual in your world already. Are you sure the issue is that you can't? Or is it that you can't be bothered? *Note this squidgeyness of biology - I had to specify "genetically" male, because there are cases where that morphology you mention does not match the genes, either by early accident, or by later medical design. [/QUOTE]

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