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posted by Fnord666 on Friday May 05 2017, @09:53AM   Printer-friendly
from the language-evolves-too dept.

Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard

When uploaded to Netflix, an episode of the educational children's show "Bill Nye the Science Guy" cut out a segment saying that chromosomes determine one's gender.

[...] While noncontroversial at the time, the 1996 segment appears to contradict Netflix's new series "Bill Nye Saves the World."

The new show endorses a socially liberal understanding of gender, under which gender is defined by self-identification rather than genetics and there are more than just the two traditional genders.

People, people, people... Say it with me: The Internet Never Forgets.

Source: http://freebeacon.com/culture/netflix-edits-bill-nye-episode-remove-segment-chromosomes-determine-gender/


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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by NotSanguine on Friday May 05 2017, @12:56PM (31 children)

    Which makes gender a cultural construct. Which was my whole point. There is a difference between biological "sex" and cultural "gender".

    Being born with or without a Y chromosome is not a cultural construct. One may as well claim species to be a social construct, declare themselves a poodle and go crap on their neighbours lawn. Secure psychiatric institutions -- these are social constructs!

    That's right. If you have a Y chromosome (except in cases where you have XXY and female genitalia), you are male. That's your sex.

    How you are perceived and classified in the culture is much more complicated, at least for a small number of people.

    What's more, Research shows that varying hormone levels at various times during pregnancy can create the situation where the body has one set of characteristics, while the brain is configured differently. Those are biological and physiological traits.
    https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/02/150213112317.htm [sciencedaily.com]
    people.kzoo.edu/ggregg/biolgend.ppt

    I really don't understand what the big deal is about this. Those who identify their gender as distinct from their biological sex make up maybe 1% of the population. Live and let live, I say.

    Even if there are folks who want to blur the lines (and that's nothing new), who cares? It doesn't affect anyone else.

    It amazes me that folks think that they should have the right to dictate to others how they should live their lives.

    Heinlein [goodreads.com] had the right idea:

    “The correct way to punctuate a sentence that states: "Of course it is none of my business, but -- " is to place a period after the word "but." Don't use excessive force in supplying such a moron with a period. Cutting his throat is only a momentary pleasure and is bound to get you talked about.”

    So go ahead and live however you want. But you don't have the right to force your beliefs and lifestyle on anyone else. Don't be a "self-righteous fathead who mistakes his trained-in prejudices for the laws of nature."

    --
    No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
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  • (Score: 1, Flamebait) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday May 05 2017, @01:08PM (29 children)

    You can say it as much as you like but it's never going to be true. Gender = sex. What a thing is, it is, and no amount of wishing or denial will change that.

    Now you can let your freak flag fly however you like and that's fine with me but I'm not going to make special allowances or effort to make you feel comfortable with your particular peccadilloes. I have no moral obligation to do so and you have no grounds to demand that I do.

    --
    My rights don't end where your fear begins.
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @02:01PM (5 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @02:01PM (#504845)

      Do you also have arguments with people about the usage of "hacker" to mean "criminal who uses computers"?

      • (Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday May 05 2017, @02:51PM (2 children)

        Yup.

        --
        My rights don't end where your fear begins.
        • (Score: 3, Informative) by Gaaark on Friday May 05 2017, @09:59PM (1 child)

          by Gaaark (41) on Friday May 05 2017, @09:59PM (#505182) Journal

          Me too.

          --
          --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
          • (Score: 2) by Bot on Friday May 05 2017, @11:16PM

            by Bot (3902) on Friday May 05 2017, @11:16PM (#505210) Journal

            Me 11.

            --
            Account abandoned.
      • (Score: 3, Touché) by tangomargarine on Friday May 05 2017, @03:37PM (1 child)

        by tangomargarine (667) on Friday May 05 2017, @03:37PM (#504930)

        I know, all those prescriptivist assholes ruining the language for everybody. Oh wait...

        --
        "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
        • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Sunday May 07 2017, @01:36AM

          by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Sunday May 07 2017, @01:36AM (#505655) Journal

          Hah, nice. You just about made me cat /usr/bin/teacup/tea | /dev/hazuki/nose > /mnt/desktop with that one :D That low-key, snarky cutting humor is awesome.

          --
          I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
    • (Score: 4, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Friday May 05 2017, @02:03PM (9 children)

      You can say it as much as you like but it's never going to be true. Gender = sex. What a thing is, it is, and no amount of wishing or denial will change that.

      Now you can let your freak flag fly however you like and that's fine with me but I'm not going to make special allowances or effort to make you feel comfortable with your particular peccadilloes. I have no moral obligation to do so and you have no grounds to demand that I do.

      As an aside, I am male and identify as such. I have never had any confusion about that. As such, I have no "freak flag" to fly and my peccadilloes don't run into those areas.

      I'm not telling you what to do. If you come to my house, I might make certain requests regarding your behavior or what you bring with you. You, of course, can decline based on those strictures. No harm no foul. Other than that, I have no interest in telling you what you should or shouldn't do or say.

      I'm not trying to PC you into silence. Not that it matters, but I generally appreciate your bluntness. I don't believe I've ever even intimated that you should modify your speech or behavior for *any* reason. Nor would I. It's not my business. Full stop.

      What I'm telling you is that (read the links I posted if you like, I think you'll find them illuminating) you're flat wrong on the science.

      Make of that what you will. It's no skin off my nose either way, Buzzard.

      --
      No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday May 05 2017, @02:51PM (8 children)

        I don't personally care about what science has to say about how people choose to view themselves, because I don't care how people choose to view themselves. What I'm saying is pick a different word, you can't have this one; it's already in use.

        --
        My rights don't end where your fear begins.
        • (Score: 3, Funny) by NotSanguine on Friday May 05 2017, @03:04PM (1 child)

          Gender on rye, with swiss cheese and mustard.
          That was a helluva gender last night, wasn't it?
          I've been gendering about that for weeks!
          So many genders, so little time.
          If you get a gender, you should make sure you really want it. They're hard to remove.

          Have a great gender, Buzzard!

          --
          No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
        • (Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Friday May 05 2017, @04:40PM

          by fustakrakich (6150) on Friday May 05 2017, @04:40PM (#504985) Journal

          I don't personally care about what science has to say

          Uh oh! I think I've heard that before. Anyway, it has become a disturbing trend

          --
          La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
        • (Score: 3, Insightful) by DeathMonkey on Friday May 05 2017, @05:01PM (2 children)

          by DeathMonkey (1380) on Friday May 05 2017, @05:01PM (#505001) Journal

          I don't personally care about what science has to say...

          You don't care what the science says.
          You don't care what the dictionary says.

          Yet, you accuse others of playing fast-and-loose with definitions.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @05:35PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @05:35PM (#505025)

            The dictionary is biased and liberal. It does not reflect the modern understanding of the word.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @03:58PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @03:58PM (#505450)

            He is a turd, the remains of dead animals eaten by an ugly bird. He is a mighty piece of crap!

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @01:03AM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @01:03AM (#505245)

          What I'm saying is pick a different word, you can't have this one; it's already in use.

          Who made you the word police?
          You obviously care, very, very much.
          Why?

          What is it to you if other people use a word in a way that has nothing to do with you?
          As an individualist above all else, you seem to be oddly over-invested in the collective usage of a word.

          Why are you unable to say, "fine, have your stupid definition" and then go on living your life never using the definition that you find so offensive?

    • (Score: 2) by linuxrocks123 on Friday May 05 2017, @02:58PM (2 children)

      by linuxrocks123 (2557) on Friday May 05 2017, @02:58PM (#504906) Journal

      In many languages, all nouns, including inanimate objects, are arbitrarily assigned to have a certain gender. In some languages, there are more than two genders to which nouns are assigned. When taking the relevant classes, this information was always phrased as "Latin has three genders" and never as "Latin has three sexes". Gender and sex do not have identical meanings in standard English.

      • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday May 05 2017, @03:35PM (1 child)

        by tangomargarine (667) on Friday May 05 2017, @03:35PM (#504929)

        Good points but I have a nit to pick.

        In some languages, there are more than two genders to which nouns are assigned.

        Isn't neuter more accurately described as an absence of gender, rather than a third gender?

        Hell, for some wacky reason the German word for "girl" is neuter (das Mädchen).

        The bottom line is that we should not confuse the name 'gender' for biological sex, because grammatical gender is merely a way for partitioning reality into different sets of things on a grammatical basis.

        - are there languages with more than 3 genders [quora.com] (yeah okay hardly a reputable source lol)

        --
        "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
        • (Score: 4, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday May 05 2017, @05:59PM

          by AthanasiusKircher (5291) on Friday May 05 2017, @05:59PM (#505047) Journal

          Isn't neuter more accurately described as an absence of gender, rather than a third gender?

          No, that comes from confusing grammatical gender with sex.

          Gender etymologically [etymonline.com] is related to genre and ultimately to Latin genus. It just means "class" of things. That's it. It used to just mean grammatical classification. In English it came to have reference to male/female sex in the 15th century, but it wasn't until the 20th century that it really became strongly associated with that (and even then, it was originally used as a sort of humorous way of saying "sex" once "sex" became more of a "dirty word" in polite conversation).

          Anyhow, historically and etymologically, gender was primarily a classification scheme for words, not a reference to biological sex. As such, neuter words definitely have a gender, i.e., classification.

    • (Score: 5, Informative) by butthurt on Friday May 05 2017, @03:00PM (6 children)

      by butthurt (6141) on Friday May 05 2017, @03:00PM (#504907) Journal

      Oxford University Press is apparently fully SJW-converged. Its first definition of "gender":

      1 Either of the two sexes (male and female), especially when considered with reference to social and cultural differences rather than biological ones. The term is also used more broadly to denote a range of identities that do not correspond to established ideas of male and female. [...]

      -- https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/gender [oxforddictionaries.com]

      • (Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Friday May 05 2017, @03:08PM (5 children)

        2. Either of the two main categories (male and female) into which humans and most other living things are divided on the basis of their reproductive functions.
        ‘adults of both sexes’

        --https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/sex

        Multiple dictionaries say the same thing. Gosh, those SJWs are everywhere!

        --
        No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @09:07PM (4 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @09:07PM (#505156)

          There is a lot of irony in your embrace of the range of definitions of gender and your hardcore insistence on the narrow usage of the term "race."

          I'm sure you've got some rationalization why the same dictionary is correct for one word and incorrect for another.

          • (Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Friday May 05 2017, @09:42PM (3 children)

            There is a lot of irony in your embrace of the range of definitions of gender and your hardcore insistence on the narrow usage of the term "race."

            I'm sure you've got some rationalization why the same dictionary is correct for one word and incorrect for another.

            Yup. Because I said so. Life is wonderful, isn't it?

            --
            No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @01:31AM (2 children)

              by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @01:31AM (#505259)

              Yup. Because I said so. Life is wonderful, isn't it?

              Looks like you and buzzard are in complete harmony.

              • (Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Saturday May 06 2017, @01:44AM (1 child)

                Yup. Because I said so. Life is wonderful, isn't it?

                Looks like you and buzzard are in complete harmony.

                If somone's going to whinge like a six year old, they're going to get the standard mommy response.

                --
                No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
                • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @02:09PM

                  by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @02:09PM (#505421)

                  If somone's going to whinge like a six year old, they're going to get the standard mommy response.

                  Haha. When the might dummy does it, he's a 6-year old princess stamping his foot.
                  When you do it you are a mommy.

                  Your cognitive dissonance is showing.

    • (Score: 1) by Weasley on Friday May 05 2017, @03:20PM (1 child)

      by Weasley (6421) on Friday May 05 2017, @03:20PM (#504925)

      You can say it as much as you like but it's never going to be true.

      I was agreeing with you but you're just sounding foolish now. Gay used to mean happy. Now it means homosexual and using gay to mean happy is extremely archaic. This change happened quickly. It could happen just as quick with gender.

    • (Score: 2) by Gaaark on Friday May 05 2017, @10:15PM

      by Gaaark (41) on Friday May 05 2017, @10:15PM (#505191) Journal

      I guess I agree:

      After thinking a bit about it, I don't call it a gender issue: I'd call it a way of thinking.

        I think of myself as a male, and my body agrees.
      If my body didn't agree, then I would say my gender is female, but I consider my brain male (or neuter??)

      I guess I look at body as gender,but way of thinking is different from gender.

      I just don't look as gender as anything but sex, I guess.

      --
      --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
  • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @01:31PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @01:31PM (#504829)

    That's right. If you have a Y chromosome (except in cases where you have XXY and female genitalia), you are male. That's your sex.

    Thank you. I would add that most people born with XXY chromosome anomalies have a male phenotype and that in these instances we are discussing rare congenital conditions and not genders.

    I really don't understand what the big deal is about this. Those who identify their gender as distinct from their biological sex make up maybe 1% of the population. Live and let live, I say.

    Now we get to the crux of the matter, the aggressive normalisation and promotion of non-binary nonsense to the extent that children are being raised as gender neutral. That is everyone's business because in many cases, it is clear psychological abuse. Individuals suffering from gender dysphoria are rare, the more vociferous individuals attempting to bully others into favoured pronoun usage appear to be these gender non-conformity types.