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Male

57 (77%)

Female

10 (13.5%)

Non-binary

7 (9.5%)

Total Members Voted: 73

[Maximum Spin]

Sex is clearly not the same as gender, because only words can have gender.

[Tinnucorch]

This thread is at best going to derive in a discussion totally unrelated to dwarf fortress, and at worst it's just going to be breeding ground for sexist and transphobic jokes (as it's already becoming). I'm highly skeptic of the ability of people to behave on the internet so I think the sooner this is locked, the better.

[Starver]

DF is found on Bay12.
Bay12 is on the web.
The web is on the internet.
There are no girls on the internet.
Therefore no girls can find DF.
I'm sure some of them were given access to DF by their boyfriends, husbands, fathers and sons, etc, but they're still not on Bay12 forums, as already conclusively shown...


(BTW, not wanting to start that discussion, but be aware that gender=sex!)

Fixed it for you.

why

I'm still at the "what" stage.

/goes back to see what typo was obviously made, and not made obvious with bold-text...

[Putnam]

they replaced ≠ with =

[Ninjabread]

Urist clearly does want to start that discussion. Let's not feed the troll, and hopefully they don't end up trashing the smithy before the militia has any gear.

Seriously though, do trolls actively seek my forges or something? If ever I make the mistake of leaving the caverns open they're always in there punching something metalworking-related.

[Cathar]

Can I have a link to the project? I had a similar idea, but panicked on how much data I would have to mine and gave up before it started.

Well unfortunately I keep all my data stored in my rectum and we have yet to come up with the technology to link it directly on the internet (a webcam does not fit in)

Also, on a more serious note, about that sex vs gender issue, this is a case where both side are absolutely wrong because no one read the text.

When you're an embryo, you may or may not go through a process of virilization, which is activated by a part of the Y chromozome. It's straightforward as it is. Either you go through virilization, in which case you're male, or you don't, in which case you're female. There is no in between. Virilization may be incomplete, anomalies may occur where the virilization process is activated because of a faulty X chromosome, etc, but the determining factor is ; does it happened or not ? So that's for your sex.

Gender as determined by Bourdieu is the collective representations linked to sex. They are "fluid" because representations differ between geography and time. Male roles and female roles are not spaceless and timeless, they evolve, what a shocker. That doesn't mean you can change them at will or make your own. They are part of collective representations.

So yeah. If your sex is male chances are your gender is male. Even if the male gender in western society includes the ability to carry female pronouns. This is part of the representations of the male gender.

Now hopefully we all learnt something and can avoid a sterile debate (lol)

[Putnam]

it's, uh, more complicated than you say.

[Cathar]

This doesn't have anything to do with what I wrote. Gender is determined by the society you're a part of as a collective representation, sex by the virilization process. What happens in your brain is absolutely irrelevant.

The fact society accomodates for gender disphoria and accepts to switch gender pronouns for individual who transition is just an exemple of the fluidity of gender, as in other society, it is unconceivable that a man would want to be called she. Collective representations of a time and a place ; that's gender

Also just to clarify : I'm perfectly ok with calling people by the pronouns they want to be called. That's not the issue. Gender is a useful concept for anthropology and social science and I'd like the word to say what it means. Stretching it into meaninglessness invariably leads to debate that completely miss the point because neither side know what they are talking about.

[Dozebôm Lolumzalěs]

Terminology debates are almost never productive. Just keep in mind that different people use the same word to refer to different things.

I feel that you are stretching it when you derive "AMAB means you're a man, by definition" from "gender is a collective representation of a time and a place".

Perhaps "gender identity" would be a good term for what Putnam and I are probably using, and "societal gender" or "gender the social construct", etc. for what you are? (I'm assuming that by gender, you're talking about the set of behaviors, expectations, and norms associated with sex. Your words don't entirely pin down what you mean.)

[Cathar]

Terminology debates are almost never productive.

In this case, this is the entierity of the debate. It's a discussion about the meaning of words, and it is pointless because these meanings are already established.
I've seen far too many discussion between "today I feel like I'm 55% female" versus "it's my god given right to call you a dude", which make me bang my head on my keyboard. Definining the terms effectively ends the debate, this is how pointless it is.

I'm assuming that by gender, you're talking about the set of behaviors, expectations, and norms associated with sex.

Sounds like pretty clear. Yes, this is what I am talking about.

[Dozebôm Lolumzalěs]

Technically, "gender" is a linguistic term and is only related to sex through that fact that many languages use gender to describe sex. But this doesn't really matter in a discussion about gender-as-it-is-meant-today. Similarly, the concept of social gender may predate the concept of gender identity, but that doesn't mean that gender identity is irrelevant. Meanings are not permanently established - people now use gender in a personal sense rather than just a societal sense. (related to prescriptivism vs descriptivism?)

(And gender is just the term we use to describe things. We could talk about gender without ever using the word "gender", so if you are bothered by people coopting sociological jargon, that doesn't mean much on the object level.)

There are many... applications? Connections to reality?... of the gender debate. If we sort people by gender or sex for a purpose, should individual identification or external apparent properties decide how we sort? How much is one expected to alter their language to accommodate others' preferences? Do we need a Single Defining Trait to underlie gender and sex, or is it fine to accept edge cases and consider categories to be clusters rather than definite, hard, binary categories?

Saying "anthropologists used this word first" doesn't help answer *any* of these questions. Yes, much discussion of gender consists entirely of people talking past each other, but that doesn't mean that the topic of discussion doesn't matter.

Not a TL;DR, but an underlying theme that I want to spell out: making a superficial observation about the way in which something is spoken doesn't reveal much about the referent of the speech.

[KittyTac]

Sex = Your set of chromosomes. You're male, female, or defective. Nothing else.

Gender = A societal construct usually related to sex, but not always.

[Cathar]

If we sort people by gender or sex for a purpose, should individual identification or external apparent properties decide how we sort?

Talking about sex : Virilization process [Y/N]. It's straightforward and leaves no room for interpretation, in between, and needs no mind reading.
Talking about gender : Long drawn out social study meant for a specialized public

If you stretch gender's meaning to the point an individual can change it at will, and the governments have to adapt to the choice of individuals, it means nothing practical and can be safely disregarded as irrelevant data. It is not the government's job to legislate what happens in people's brain, nor should it be.

If you are asking for my opinion, I believe reference to gender and sex should be stripped from government papers, but if there is a need for it, then biological sex is a better tool than mind reading individuals for their self identification. In the same time, the don't-be-a-dick rule suggest you should address people how they wish to be adressed.

Edit : There is no gender issue that cannot be solved by erasing gender from legislation alltogether. Gay marriage, gender identity, etc. all is solved by eliminating gender from legislation alltogether. You'll then run into completely new issues such as sports or service into the police or military forces, but those issues will arise with a muddied-into-oblivion definition of gender too.

[George_Chickens]

This is an inaccurate and inefficient way to learn about the gender demographics of bay12'rs.

What you ought to do is determine the gender of Pathos.

We are all Pathos. There are no girls on the internet, only Pathos. Therefore, Pathos exists beyond sex.

[voliol]

Sex = Your set of chromosomes. You're male, female, or defective. Nothing else.

Calling intersex people defective is a bit distasteful. That said, I vouch for this thread to be locked, it's getting out of hand.