Liberals, why can't someone choose their race?

Ken-1122

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Race being considered more than gender does not entail it is more expressive in nature, that's faulty reasoning,
Okay; if you want to make the case that Gender is more expressive in nature than race, you need to provide citations or something other than your word.
 
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muichimotsu

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Okay; if you want to make the case that Gender is more expressive in nature than race, you need to provide citations or something other than your word.
The discussion doesn't count in any manner? I can present an argument, it's not my word, it's statements you can find fault in that are general in nature, not just an observation that stands on face value.

You've barely demonstrated in any way how race is more expressive in nature than gender beyond one isolated example and generalizing that to suggest our taking race more seriously in particular contexts means it's necessarily as complex as gender, a concept that's arguably older in terms of the usage, particularly as applied to language.

And that was far before the historical usages we see conflating it with sex when they were historically distinct, the psychological idea of gender later, but the conflation before that not based in the understanding you seem to think that the words were synonymous when we have demonstrable fact that gender applied in the masculine/feminine sense, the societal/cultural aspects, particularly to language, rather than sex applying to the male/female, the biological aspects.
 
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Ken-1122

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The discussion doesn't count in any manner? I can present an argument, it's not my word, it's statements you can find fault in that are general in nature, not just an observation that stands on face value.

You've barely demonstrated in any way how race is more expressive in nature than gender beyond one isolated example and generalizing that to suggest our taking race more seriously in particular contexts means it's necessarily as complex as gender, a concept that's arguably older in terms of the usage, particularly as applied to language.

And that was far before the historical usages we see conflating it with sex when they were historically distinct, the psychological idea of gender later, but the conflation before that not based in the understanding you seem to think that the words were synonymous when we have demonstrable fact that gender applied in the masculine/feminine sense, the societal/cultural aspects, particularly to language, rather than sex applying to the male/female, the biological aspects.
I think race and gender are both expressive. Which is more expressive? It all depends on who you ask; I don’t care, and it really doesn’t matter IMO. Even if one can be proven to be more expressive than the other, it still doesn’t justify allowing one to be chosen by what goes on inside your head, but not the other.
 
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Brightmoon

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From a biological perspective race in modern Homo sapiens doesn’t exist as we’re not genetically diverse enough as a species . Other animals do have races . Gender and sex aren’t the same thing either as sex is the result of chromosome mixing at fertilization . Most but not all humans come out either male or female at that point . Notice I wrote most not all. Gender happens 5 months later when the brain develops to that point . Some people have a mismatch between their sex and their gender. That idea of just male or just female is erroneous . Human sexuality is more complex than that . You even see this in other animals . You’re trying to definitively pin down variable natural phenomena to an idea . It’s better to accept the concept that these are variable
 
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Ken-1122

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From a biological perspective race in modern Homo sapiens doesn’t exist as we’re not genetically diverse enough as a species .
So if race doesn’t exist, there should be no problem with Rachael declaring herself black! Agree?
Some people have a mismatch between their sex and their gender.
How are you defining Gender?
 
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Brightmoon

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Race in America has a social and historical meaning that doesn’t match biological realities. I don’t care what she calls herself as all of us had dark skinned ancestors from Africa. As far as Gender . There’s an older movie based on a tragic true story called Boys Don’t Cry that does a very good job of explaining gender dysphoria.
 
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Ken-1122

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Race in America has a social and historical meaning that doesn’t match biological realities. I don’t care what she calls herself as all of us had dark skinned ancestors from Africa. As far as Gender . There’s an older movie based on a tragic true story called Boys Don’t Cry that does a very good job of explaining gender dysphoria.
Thanks for answering my first question. As far as my second question, I'm not familiar with the movie. So would you mind explaining how you define gender?
 
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Brightmoon

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Human sexuality is complex . Gender happens in the brain around the 5th fetal month under the influence of the chromosomes and fetal and maternal hormones . Your sex and your gender can match or it doesn’t . Some people like Christine Jorgenson have a mismatch between their sex and their gender. They’ll complain about being in the wrong body . Ms Jorgenson was one of the first famous people to undergo a sex change operation from male to female. Some people are homosexuals being attracted to the same sex . These are biological realities which I don’t have a problem with and my Christian church accepts these people as is.
 
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Ken-1122

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Human sexuality is complex . Gender happens in the brain around the 5th fetal month under the influence of the chromosomes and fetal and maternal hormones . Your sex and your gender can match or it doesn’t . Some people like Christine Jorgenson have a mismatch between their sex and their gender. They’ll complain about being in the wrong body . Ms Jorgenson was one of the first famous people to undergo a sex change operation from male to female. Some people are homosexuals being attracted to the same sex . These are biological realities which I don’t have a problem with and my Christian church accepts these people as is.
Okay I get it; there are some whose gender and sex do not align. I understand what sex is, and I understand gender is something that happens in the brain. But my question is “what is Gender”?
 
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Ken-1122

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Race is a fiction. It is nothing more than a phenotype resulting from adaptation to a particular environment. It has no meaning.
If race had no meaning, there wouldn't be all those people giving Rachael Dolezal a hard time for identifying as black
 
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FrumiousBandersnatch

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I think the OP asks an interesting question.

It seems to me that race is a cultural construct based on superficial phenotypic differences and consequently racial identity must also be a cultural construct (or choice).

I'm not fully up to date with research in this area, but last I heard, biological sex and gender identity are rather different to race & racial identity in that biological sex is based on more fundamental genetic differences and the predisposition to major gender identity disparity seems to be established during prenatal brain development, so cultural influences have a much smaller role. IOW sex and gender identity are developmental characteristics that don't always match. Sexuality also appears to be a mainly developmental characteristic.
 
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Ken-1122

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I think the OP asks an interesting question.

It seems to me that race is a cultural construct based on superficial phenotypic differences and consequently racial identity must also be a cultural construct (or choice).
If that's the case, the same people who would have no problem accepting her as a man had she identified as one, should accept her as black because she identified that way; do you agree?

IOW sex and gender identity are developmental characteristics that don't always match. Sexuality also appears to be a mainly developmental characteristic.
How are you identifying gender?
 
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Kylie

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If race had no meaning, there wouldn't be all those people giving Rachael Dolezal a hard time for identifying as black

Isn't that like saying that if "witch" had no meaning, there wouldn't have been all those people executed for being a witch?

Just because people believe something, doesn't make it true.
 
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Ken-1122

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Isn't that like saying that if "witch" had no meaning, there wouldn't have been all those people executed for being a witch?

Just because people believe something, doesn't make it true.
Perhaps I'm misunderstanding you, but people were executed for being a witch; there are records of this happening.
 
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Kylie

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Perhaps I'm misunderstanding you, but people were executed for being a witch; there are records of this happening.

Yes, but that doesn't mean that witches are real. It just means that people suffered because of the ideas others had about witches.

Likewise, people are suffering today because of the ideas that other people have about race. Doesn't mean that the concept of race has any scientific merit. There are no genetic markers for race. There are people that we think of as black who are lighter-skinned than others we think of as white. Race, as a scientific concept, is meaningless, which is exactly what Ruthie said when she said race is a fiction. And what Frumious said when he said race is a social construct. Gender, on the other hand, has clear components to it that are not social. Trans people's brains seem to work more like the brains of their identified genders, for example. Transgender brains are more like their desired gender from an early age
 
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Ken-1122

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Likewise, people are suffering today because of the ideas that other people have about race. Doesn't mean that the concept of race has any scientific merit. There are no genetic markers for race.
There are physical differences when it comes to race; aren’t those physical differences based on genetics?
Gender, on the other hand, has clear components to it that are not social.
So what is gender?
Trans people's brains seem to work more like the brains of their identified genders, for example.
Are you saying there are differences between a male’s brain vs a female’s brain? If so what are these differences?
 
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